The Census Bureau released data this week indicating that families with children experienced high rates of financial hardship and economic insecurity for a second year in a row, as policymakers have allowed critical pandemic-era investments in children and families to expire. The Current Population Survey data showed that in 2023, 13.7 percent of children were living in poverty using the Supplemental Poverty Measure. As in previous years, among children, Latinx/e children were the most likely to be living in poverty (22 percent), followed by Black (20.3 percent), Indigenous (19.7 percent), Asian (14 percent) and White (7.2 percent) children. Immigrants, people with disabilities, and households headed by women also had high rates of poverty in 2023. The Census Bureau’s Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) is only one measure of economic wellbeing, and because the SPM poverty thresholds are low, in practice it understates the extent of economic hardship in the United States.[1] But the bottom line is clear: many families with children were struggling in 2023.[2]
The elevated poverty rates are notable given the strength of the economy last year, with more people working than at any point since 2000 and wages rising faster than prices. Taken together, the data offers striking evidence that the expanded Child Tax Credit, boosts to food assistance, and other federal investments in families made during the pandemic are necessary at all times.
At the height of the pandemic in 2020 and 2021, policymakers made historic investments in families with children, increasing both cash as well as in-kind supports, most notably through the expanded Child Tax Credit and increases to food assistance through school lunch, or P-EBT, and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) emergency allotments. Both cash and in-kind benefits proved critical for families, and in 2021 child poverty fell to the lowest level on record—5.2 percent using the SPM—and food insecurity for families with children saw a corresponding drop. CSSP consistently heard about the importance of both investments in cash and in-kind supports in our research and conversations with parents and caregivers during this period.
As Symone, a mother in Mississippi, explained to us in October 2021, the increased SNAP benefits and the monthly CTC payments each played a distinct role helping her manage her family’s budget. Symone worked as a home health aide and her partner worked long hours in food service, but raising a four-year-old and making ends meet was still difficult. SNAP gave her the peace of mind that she would have money set aside for food every month. She described SNAP as, “really good assistance; I wish everybody could get it.” Meanwhile the $300 a month she was receiving from the expanded Child Tax Credit “comes really in handy.” She received the CTC payments on the 15th of the month, which was also when she received her light bill, so she would pay her light bill, and then go out with her daughter and “get her whatever she needs.” Sometimes they would take a trip to McDonald’s so that her daughter could get a Happy Meal of chicken nuggets and French fries—her favorite. Symone valued the flexibility that cash assistance through the CTC provided, noting that as winter approaches, she could use it to buy winter clothes, or purchase toiletries and other household items not covered by SNAP. As she explained, “my daughter goes through a lot of soap. She plays with soap every night [while taking her bath]. So I would love to be able to stock up on enough soap.”
Lawmakers’ decision to sunset these investments in children and families over the last two years, however, has had predictably devastating results. In 2022, when the temporary expansion of the CTC expired, child poverty more than doubled, from 5.2 to 12.4 percent, and as this week’s Census data show it remained high in 2023. In 2023, refundable credits still lifted 6.4 million people out of poverty, including 3.4 million children; the CTC alone lifted approximately 1.4 million children out of poverty. But because lawmakers have failed to reinstate the CTC expansion, refundable credits are doing less to reduce poverty than we saw in 2021, when 9.6 million people were lifted out of poverty by refundable credits, and 5.3 million people, including 2.9 million children, were lifted out of poverty by the CTC alone.
Similarly, in 2023, as policymakers have rolled back investments in food assistance and the pandemic-era increases in SNAP benefits, we see food assistance doing less to reduce poverty, as the just-released Census Bureau data shows. In 2023, SNAP lifted 3.4 million people, including 1.3 million children, out of poverty, down from 3.7 and 1.4 million respectively in 2022. School lunch lifted 651,000 children out of poverty in 2023, compared to 828,000 the year before. As data released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture last week shows, there was a corresponding increase in food insecurity in 2023, with 13.8 million children living in households that experienced food insecurity, up 3.2 percent from 2022.
Every parent in the United States should be able to provide their children with food, clothing, a warm and well-lit home, and yes, soap and the occasional Happy Meal. This week’s Census data drive home the importance of both a guaranteed income for families with children, as well as in-kind supports like SNAP to help families make ends meet and provide what their children deserve—during a pandemic, and at all times.
[1] Interestingly, the methodology the Census Bureau uses to increase the SPM thresholds for inflation led to an unusually large increase in the SPM thresholds in 2023—especially in comparison to OPM thresholds. While this means the data is likely more effective at capturing economic hardship than previously, it makes year-over-year comparisons difficult. For example, using the SPM methodology for adjusting for inflation, the Census found that 12.9 percent of people lived in poverty in 2023, up from 12.4 percent 2022, and 13.7 percent of children were living in poverty, up from 12.4 percent 2022. But if more traditional inflation adjustments are applied to the SPM thresholds, creating an “anchored” SPM, there are no statistically significant differences in poverty rates for these groups between 2022 and 2023.
[2] The Current Population Survey is a smaller survey that produces estimates of national trends in income, poverty, and health insurance. The American Community Survey is a much larger survey, which is able to produce annual estimates of poverty (and much more) at much smaller levels of geography, though only for communities with populations of 65,000 or more; for smaller geographical areas, including tribal areas, the ACS produces 5-year estimates. The ACS data is released later this week.