Debate Over Child Tax Credit Outlives Expiration of the Expanded Credit

New York Times weighs in, seeing uphill battle
US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris arrive for an event to mark the start of monthly Child Tax Credit relief payments, in the White House complex, July 15, 2021.
US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris arrive for an event to mark the start of monthly Child Tax Credit relief payments, in the White House complex, July 15, 2021.

The New York Times article quotes Scott Winship of the American Enterprise Institute, who participated in an Education Next forum, “Should Congress Make the Expanded Child Tax Credit Permanent?” in the Fall 2021 issue.

The Times article says, “While supporters hoped the credit would boost educational or enrichment spending, a study that posed the question directly found it had not.” It is indeed accurate that there were hopes the credit would boost educational or enrichment spending; Frederick Hess, in “How a Turbocharged Child Tax Credit Could Electrify School Choice,” (Fall 2021) suggested that states could offer to match the money if it were spent on education.

The New York City-based study linked to by the Times article notwithstanding, the newspaper does interview one mother who withdrew her 12-year-old daughter from a cheerleading class “in part because of the cost” when the tax credit expired. And a Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analysis of Census Bureau data found 40 percent of low-income families were using the child tax credit money for education costs covering books and supplies, tuition, after-school programs, and transportation for school, as Education Next reported in November 2021.

The online headline the Times put on its article—“The Expanded Child Tax Credit Is Gone. The Battle Over It Remains”—is surely accurate.

—Education Next

Last Updated

NEWSLETTER

Notify Me When Education Next

Posts a Big Story

Program on Education Policy and Governance
Harvard Kennedy School
79 JFK Street, Cambridge, MA 02138
Phone (617) 496-5488
Fax (617) 496-4428
Email Education_Next@hks.harvard.edu

For subscription service to the printed journal
Phone (617) 496-5488
Email subscriptions@educationnext.org

Copyright © 2024 President & Fellows of Harvard College