Child Poverty

  • Child Poverty

    New Analysis from CDF: TANF Must Be Strengthened to Fight For Racial Justice and Help Families Afford Their Basic Needs

    We as a nation are weathering a tough storm, and low-income children and families, especially families of color, are carrying a disproportionate load of the health and economic burden. As new research shows that this pandemic could cause child poverty rates to rise by 53 percent, especially for children of color, Congress must act now. Here’s where the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program comes in.

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  • Child Poverty

    TANF Must Be Strengthened to Fight For Racial Justice and Help Families Afford Their Basic Needs

    The pandemic has magnified our nation’s failure to provide robust assistance for children and families in times of crisis. COVID-19 has also laid bare the systemic economic, social, and racial inequities embedded in our unjust systems. Today, communities of color are bearing the brunt of the fatal impacts of these injustices. People of color are more likely to have lost jobs due to COVID, are dying at more rapid rates compared to their white counterparts, and are more likely to live in poverty. As new research shows that the pandemic could cause child poverty rates to rise by 53 percent, especially for children of color, Congress must act now. Authorizing and expanding a Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Emergency Fund and making long-term changes to the TANF block grant are more important than ever to make sure children and families can survive this crisis. Families should not have to worry where their next meal will come from or face harsh requirements that were impossible to meet even before this pandemic.

  • Child Poverty

    The Child Care is Essential Act Will Ensure Desperately Needed Relief for Child Care

    CDF will continue to join the call for immediate relief to ensure child care settings and families can weather this crisis – and we are proud to endorse the Child Care is Essential Act which will help get us there. Without this funding, parents will not have the care they need to go back to work, employers will be unable to restart without workers, and our economic recovery will be jeopardized. The child care system needs to be funded like the necessity it is for families, businesses, and our economy.

    | National

  • Child Health

    The Two Deadly Diseases Plaguing Our Nation—and Our Children

    We must do better and stand up for our Black children if we are to achieve our mission to leave no child behind. We must fight for a system that treats Black children and families fairly, equally, and justly. We must commit to ending child poverty and creating a society that values the lives of all children by providing equitable, affordable, and high-quality education, health care, nutrition, and housing to all families. We will not stop fighting until we have dismantled systems of oppression and institutional racism and until our country values the lives of Black children just as much as White children. 

    | National

  • Child Poverty

    CDF Joins Call for USDA to Extend Waivers to Ensure Safe Access to Food Assistance

    We urge USDA to use its full authority to quickly extend the rest of the nationwide waivers, and state-specific waivers such as area eligibility, until September 30, 2020, or at least August 31, 2020. Extending the waivers is not only in the interest of public health, it also provides consistency for families and eases the administrative burden on state child nutrition agencies and FNS staff. The urgency of extending these waivers now cannot be understated as schools, local government agencies, and private nonprofits are making decisions today about whether or not they will continue to operate these programs this summer.

  • Child Poverty

    Pandemic TANF Assistance Is an Important Step Forward to Help Low-Income Children and Families

    Families should not have to worry where their next meal will come from or face harsh requirements that were impossible to meet even before this pandemic. The Pandemic TANF Assistance Act would provide vital assistance to families who need it most--an essential step toward comprehensive action to help children and families confronting severe economic hardship and poverty. 

    | National

  • Child Poverty

    New Analysis from CDF: Why The Child Tax Credit Must Be Expanded to Fight Child Poverty During and Beyond This Pandemic

    Nearly 12 million children, including 7.5 million Black and Latino children, are growing up in poverty in the United States - one of the highest poverty rates out of any developed country in the world. And the COVID-19 pandemic threatens to push millions more children into poverty with rates potentially climbing to the highest in 50 years.By expanding and increasing the CTC and creating a new tax credit for young children, Congress can proactively prevent millions of children from sliding into poverty during the pandemic and beyond.

    | National