Today’s Good News: States Fight Poverty With EITCs
Want to put more money in the pockets of the poor – quickly? One of the easiest ways is to get a state or city to enact an earned income tax credit (EITC) – 23 states and 2 cities have done so. Progressive States recently sent an update on the state EITC movement.
No, it doesn’t remotely solve the problems of the poor. But it does put more money in the pockets of those who need it most, while we work on more fundamental solutions. There is, of course, a federal earned income tax credit, which creates or adds to a tax refund for the poor. It mostly goes to people with children who earn less than $20K (the federal poverty rate for a family of four). Believe it or not, such people do have to pay taxes. What the states do is usually when a person is eligible for the federal EITC, they’ll tack on a state EITC, up to 35% of the federal amount. Some expand who is eligible. So it might amount to a couple grand.
Efforts are underway now in Connecticut, Kentucky, Colorado, and Pennsylvania to add an EITC. If they go through, that would put us over the halfway mark. This should be on the agenda of every social justice group that works on the local or state level.
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