This week, CDF released a plan to cut child poverty by 57 percent right away by making modest improvements in existing policies we know work.
It’s simple: Raise the minimum wage and find jobs for those unemployed or underemployed workers in families with children; boost tax credits that raise family incomes; help working parents cover the cost of child care; and make sure families with children have access to adequate housing, food and child support payments. The results would be astonishing.
Ending Child Poverty Now 2019 shows these policy improvements would:
- Reduce child poverty 57.1 percent, lifting 5.5 million children above the poverty line.
- Cut extreme child poverty 57.9 percent, lifting 1.3 million children above half the poverty line.
- Raise family incomes for 95 percent of poor children.
- Cost $52 billion—a fraction of the $1.9 trillion total cost of the tax cut Congress gave to the nation’s wealthiest individuals and corporations in 2017.
- Direct 100 percent of the new government spending for these improvements to families with children below 150 percent of the poverty line.
We know what has to be done. This report builds on the decades-long fight to eradicate child poverty and calls for immediate investment in our the nation’s children. No more studies, no more commissions; now is the time for action. To learn more about how you can join the movement to end child poverty, visit our landing page.