A new study published in JAMA has linked child tax credit payments to a reduction in child neglect and abuse.
The study was conducted by the Georgia Institute of Technology and involved the 2021 expansion of the federal Child Tax Credit (CTC).
For the study, the researchers looked at visits to hospital facilities before and after the implementation of the tax credit, which involved about 38 million families in America and monthly payments stemming from an estimated $300 per child in 2021.
“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. Data were analyzed from July to August 2022,” the authors explained in their report.
What researchers determined: “These findings suggest that federal income supports to parents are associated with immediate reductions in child abuse and neglect-related ED visits.”
“These results are important for discussions of making the temporary expansion of the CTC permanent and are applicable to income support policies more broadly.”
