Trump and Harris both back a bigger kid responsibility financing. But which families should get it?

WASHINGTON — Never before in a presidential election pattern has there been so much talk of the kid responsibility financing — a tool many Democrats and Republicans have endorsed as a way to lift children and youthful families out of poverty.

Just three years ago, kid poverty rates fell significantly when President Joe Biden’s administration raised the kid responsibility financing and made even the poorest families eligible. But the expansion only lasted a year. Congress declined to renew it.

There is aspiration for another boost in the responsibility financing, regardless of who wins Tuesday’s presidential election, but tension remains over who should qualify.

Democrats seek a massive — and costly — expansion of the social safety net. Vice President Kamala Harris has pitched a major boost to the kid responsibility financing as part of her presidential campaign. Rather than providing the advantage through a responsibility refund, she wants to send monthly payments to parents, even those who aren’t working and pay no turnover responsibility. Republicans have expressed back for increasing the responsibility financing but also concern that for some parents, it could become an incentive not to work.

For all its economic prosperity, childhood poverty remains pervasive in the United States. Children under 5 are the age throng most likely to encounter poverty and eviction, and more than one in six youthful people under 18 live below the federal poverty line. Meanwhile, it’s getting more expensive to raise a kid, with the expense of groceries, kid worry and housing going up.

“Expanding the kid responsibility financing is the single most effective alternative on the table for reducing kid poverty in America,” said Christy Gleason of Save the Children, a global humanitarian organization concentrated on the well-being of children. “Families are demanding it. Voters are demanding it.”

Currently, the kid responsibility financing gives families a $2,000 discount on their responsibility invoice for every kid under the age of 17 in their worry. Families that pay less than $2,000 in turnover responsibility get a smaller advantage, and parents who are out of the workforce get none.

Harris has made expanding the responsibility financing central to her campaign’s messaging on the economy. Her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, has a resume that includes passing a state kid responsibility financing.

Former President Donald Trump doubled the amount of the kid responsibility financing during his administration. His presidential campaign declined to provide specifics on his plans for the kid responsibility financing except to declare he would weigh significantly increasing it.

Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, raised the possibility of increasing the kid responsibility financing to $5,000 so that more parents can remain home with their children in an interview on CBS’ Face the country. But some Republicans have been leery about expanding it to parents who are not working outside the home.

After voting down a kid responsibility financing invoice in August, Senate Republican chief Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said for remain-at-home parents the advantage amounts to “liquid assets welfare instead of relief for working taxpayers.”

The stakes of that debate are high for parents who are unable to work because of a disability, or because they are caring for children or elderly parents. Many have been excluded from the advantage because they are not earning turnover.

Kandice Beckford, 25, is among those. She was a medical assistant at Howard University Hospital in Washington, D.C., last year when her pregnancy made her too ill to work, forcing her to quit.

She was homeless even when she was earning a paycheck, bouncing between the homes of friends and relatives. When she left the hospital after giving birth in April, she still had no permanent place to remain. There was little she could do except connect with social service agencies — and pray.

“I’m a godly woman, so I really tried to leave most of that in God’s hands,” Beckford said. “It was worrisome, but I tried not to let it overpower my life and my thinking.”

Beckford’s narrative underscores the financial precarity many families — and single mothers in particular — face in raising children. If she doesn’t profit to work this year, she won’t qualify for any advantage.

The Harris proposal would make every household eligible regardless of turnover, providing $6,000 in benefits to families with newborns and $3,600 for each kid after that. She wants to pay it out in monthly payments so families would not have to wait for a responsibility profit. Harris plans to raise taxes on corporations and the wealthiest Americans to pay for the schedule, in part by allowing responsibility credits adopted under the Trump administration in 2017 to expire.

As president, Trump doubled the kid responsibility financing from $1,000 to $2,000 and raised the turnover cap, allowing families earning up to $400,000 to receive the advantage. The kid responsibility financing passed under his administration will expire at the complete of next year. If the next Congress and president do not act, the financing will fall back to $1,000 a kid.

In 2021, as part of his American Rescue schedule, President Joe Biden expanded the financing to $3,000 per kid — and $3,600 for children under the age of 6 — and made it available to every household with citizen children, regardless of their turnover. It cut kid poverty in half by one assess. But those gains were erased when it expired.

In September, Beckford finally got into a shelter for women and their children in Maryland and was connected with a social service agency that has helped her with many of the costs a recent baby brings, including a stroller and car seat, clothing and toys.

When asked about her dreams for her daughter Inari, Beckford ticked off a list: She wants Inari to be smarter than her and to get “the best education there is to have.” Inari is already exceeding her advancement milestones, and Beckford is relishing in her growth.

Her last aspiration was something that sounded basic, but has proven elusive for Beckford and so many other American mothers.

“I desire her to have a stable life,” Beckford said.

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Associated Press writer Josh Boak contributed to this update.

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This narrative has been corrected to note that Biden expanded the kid responsibility financing in his American Rescue schedule, not the expense boost Reduction Act.