![]() ![]() Alternatively, families could have provided information to the Internal Revenue Service to get stimulus payments during the COVID-19 pandemic. 10 To be eligible, families had to have filed a 2019 or 2020 tax return and claimed the CTC on the return. ![]() 10 The expansion also included advanced payments-disbursed before tax refund season-of up to $300 per month for each child younger than 6 years and up to $250 per month for each child aged 6 through 17 years to eligible families. Under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (referred to hereafter as the American Rescue Plan), the CTC increased by $1000 to $1600 per child and expanded eligibility to include parents of 17-year-olds. The Child Tax Credit (CTC) is a partially refundable credit to tax-filing parents that is typically delivered to families as a lump-sum payment via a tax refund. These employment decisions can also affect child maltreatment, which can confound the estimated effects of income support. 3 - 8 However, these studies are unable to separately estimate the effects of income and those of employment-related decisions, such as whether, how much, and when to work. For example, a more generous Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and higher minimum wages have been shown to reduce child maltreatment and foster care entry. 2 A growing body of research supports the idea that one of the most effective means of preventing child maltreatment-particularly neglect-is by providing income support to families. These results are important for discussions of making the temporary expansion of the CTC permanent and are applicable to income support policies more broadly.Īpproximately 37% of all US children are the subject of an investigation by child protective services during childhood, 1 and children in low-income families are at a substantially higher rate of maltreatment than children in higher-income households. These reductions did not persist, however.Ĭonclusions and Relevance These findings suggest that federal income supports to parents are associated with immediate reductions in child abuse and neglect-related ED visits. ![]() There were significant reductions in such ED visits among male children (point estimate, −0.40 95% CI, −0.75 to −0.06 P = .02) and non-Hispanic White children (point estimate, −0.69 95% CI, −1.22 to −0.17 P = .01). There was a decrease in these ED visits in the 4 days following the advance CTC payments, although the reduction was not significant (point estimate, −0.22 95% CI, −0.45 to 0.01 P = .06). The 2021 advance payments of the expanded CTC were associated with fewer child abuse and neglect-related ED visits. Results During the study period, there were 3169 ED visits related to child abuse or neglect. Main Outcomes and Measures Daily child abuse and neglect-related ED visits. Data were analyzed from July to August 2022.Įxposures Timing in the disbursement of the expanded CTC advance payments. Participants were pediatric emergency department (ED) patients identified as experiencing child abuse or neglect at a level I pediatric hospital system in the Southeastern US from July through December 2021. The study compared 2021 trends with the same period in 20, during which no CTC payments were made. A fixed-effects approach was used to compare child abuse and neglect before and after payments were made in 2021. Objective To estimate the short-term association of universal and unconditional income payments to parents with child abuse and neglect.ĭesign, Setting, and Participants In this cross-sectional study, variation in the timing of the 2021 expanded child tax credit (CTC) advance payments was used to determine whether receiving unconditional income is associated with child abuse and neglect. ![]() However, income supports tied to employment cannot separate the associations of income from those of employment. Importance Poverty has long been associated with a higher risk for child maltreatment, and recent research suggests that income support policies are associated with reduced child abuse and neglect.
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