Expansion of child tax credit, which could cut child poverty rate in half this year, is 'big deal' to many rural residents

In a legendary hot-mic moment in 2010, then-Vice President Biden told President Obama that passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was a "big f----ing deal." The same might be said for the child tax credit expansion in the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, according to some in rural southeastern Kentucky, writes Linda Blackford of the Lexington Herald-Leader.

"It is such a big deal ... it’s making me want to cry," Letcher County bakery owner Gwen Johnson told Blackford. "A rising tide lifts everybody, and this will enable families to do things they’ve not been able to do before, so they can live a little better." Nearly half the county's children live in poverty.

A Columbia University study found that the tax credit, if made permanent, could cut the nation's child poverty rate in half, Blackford reports. The plan increases the current $2,000 per-child credit to $3,000 for each child 6 to 17 and $3,600 for those under 6. More low-income parents qualify, since they no longer have to owe taxes in order to get it. The payments will likely be available as soon as July, and could be distributed monthly rather than as a lump sum.

Dee Davis, director of the national Center for Rural Strategies in the Letcher County seat of Whitesburg, said the change will make a big difference in Kentucky's longstanding child-poverty problem. "It’s crazy, you can’t justify it, but nothing ever happens," he told Blackford. "Then all of sudden in 50 days, Biden passes a law that will cut child poverty in half in counties that voted against him four to one. That’s all the social math in the world right there. It changes the horizons these kids can look to, it changes what’s possible for the families. It changes everything."

Though no Republicans in Congress voted for the relief bill, Blackford doubts voters in deep-red southeastern Kentucky will penalize longtime Rep. Hal Rogers, since "cultural issues like abortion or gay marriage" are usually ascendant, but the credit could move the needle in the long run, and it highlights a stark contrast in the two parties' governing styles—and how effective they are.

"Republicans prefer top-down aid, like tax cuts for rich people, which have been their modus operandi for 40 years, the trickle-down economics that have created the greatest income inequality since the Gilded Age," Blackford writes. "According to an analysis by the Washington Post, the last round of tax cuts in 2017 accrued the most benefits for the top 1 percent, while the American Rescue Plan will give the most benefits to the lowest income quintile. Of course, some of the money may get spent unwisely, and on the other hand, no, it’s not enough. We still need to address other issues like raising the minimum wage and forgiving some college debt. But like the pandemic, this new benefit has the power to show why government can do good and help people, especially the most vulnerable ones."