Working families in New York are struggling to get by. Let’s give them a real shot at making it.
My New York Healthy Birth Grant & Working Families Tax Credit can permanently slash child poverty.
The New York Healthy Birth Grant
New York has one of the highest child poverty rates in the nation.
The birth of a child increases the likelihood of family poverty by 33%; spikes in poverty following childbirth are particularly pronounced for Black and Latina mothers. Yet the US is one of only a few wealthy countries worldwide that doesn’t provide financial support to new parents.
That’s why I’ve proposed the New York Healthy Birth Grant, a new program that would give low-income families a one-time grant of $1,800 when they have a child.
Researchers estimate that a one-time $1,800 birth grant could slash the poverty rate from nearly 26% to under 10% for new mothers receiving Medicaid. And children who receive birth grants end up with better academic performance, higher chances of graduating high school, and increased earnings into adulthood.
The program is intended to tackle one of the most important social determinants of health: childhood poverty. While the New York Healthy Birth Grant would be the first statewide grant of its kind in the U.S., the state would be following the lead of most other industrialized democracies, which already offer birth grants to ward off falls into poverty that a newborn often induces for families.
Working families are the backbone of New York, but raising a family in this state shouldn’t mean living in backbreaking poverty. No parent should have to worry about whether they can afford to feed and house their newborn child.
The New York Healthy Birth Grant gives New Yorkers the lifeline they need to start a thriving family, and it also provides a boost to local economies across the state. It’s one of the smartest investments we can make in our children’s future.
The Working Families Tax Credit
When the federal government temporarily expanded the federal Child Tax Credit, they transformed millions of lives. The expansion lifted 2.9 million children out of poverty, driving the rate of child poverty to record lows.
But Washington dropped the ball and let the expanded credit expire. Since then, we’ve seen the consequences: child poverty has more than doubled.
My New York State Working Families Tax Credit can change that.
Here’s how it works:
The Working Families Tax Credit streamlines and fills gaps in current state tax credits by including minors who are 17 years old and families regardless of citizenship status. It also eliminates the phase-in, allowing the lowest-income families to receive the biggest credit.
The plan also increases the benefit for all families by raising the maximum credit to $1,600 per child, providing a $100 minimum credit per child regardless of income, eliminating the cap on the number of eligible kids and pinning the credit to inflation.
The new credit would be paid out quarterly, providing families with four payments per year instead of just one annual lump sum.
The Working Families Tax Credit would be “the boldest state proposal” in nearly two decades and “reduce complexity for families,” according to the Niskanen Center. The impacts would be far-reaching, too: when families’ basic needs are met, their educational outcomes and employment opportunities grow, benefiting not only the families themselves, but their communities, too.
Right now, New York's own child tax credit is decoupled from the federal one, so the state credit won't expand even if Congress expands theirs. We can change that and do right by working families, ensuring they've got the resources to thrive.
If we want New York to be a place where families have a shot at making it, we have to give them the resources to take that shot. The Working Families Tax Credit gives New Yorkers the support they need to make ends meet, whether that be buying essentials like groceries and clothes, or simply paying rent to keep the roof over their head. If a divided, polarized Congress can do it, New York can too. It's time for us to step up and do right by working families.
“What we know is that families use these credits to provide for the daily necessities of their children. They use them to buy diapers. These are incredibly simple but effective tools to enable parents to be the best parents they can be.”
New York’s settlement house families are struggling with food insecurity. The Working Families Tax Credit can help.
United Neighborhood Houses and Educational Alliance surveyed over 1,000 families in New York settlement houses after the expanded Child Tax Credit expired, and found they face persistent challenges with food insecurity, financial precarity, and housing instability.
Nearly 40% of parents surveyed said they “always” or “often” ran out of money in the past six months.
One-third (33%) of parents had visited a food bank in the last seven days.
Nearly half (48%) of parents said it was hard to pay for housing; Black and Latinx parents were more likely to report housing-related hardships.
More than one in five parents carried over $10,000 in non-mortgage debt, such as credit card or student loan debt.
The report concludes that tax credit reforms like those laid out in the Working Families Tax Credit can help these families make ends meet.
“By putting money back into the pockets of people who need it most, the Working Families Tax Credit offers financial empowerment to hardworking families.”