75°
65º | 79°
Millions of American families with children received Child Tax Credit payments paid directly to their bank accounts on July 15.
As part of President Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, the Child Tax Credit increased from $2,000 per child to $3,000 per child for children over the age of six and from $2,000 to $3,600 for children under the age of six, and raised the age limit from 16 to 17. As a result, approximately 15 million families will receive the full credit which amounts to monthly payments of $300 for each child age five and younger and $250 for those between ages five and 17, AP News reported.
"No child should have to live in poverty," U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-Houston) wrote in a July 15 Twitter post. "The American Rescue Plan's #ChildTaxCredit will help lift millions of American families out of poverty and give parents the resources they need to help their children succeed."
The Child Tax Credit was previously only available to people who earned enough money to owe income taxes and most eligible families received their payments paid directly to their bank accounts automatically without having to take any action.
Biden said that the payments will average $423 per family and will could decrease child poverty by up to 50%, NBC News reported.
“This would be the largest ever one-year decrease in child poverty in the history of the United States of America,” the president said, according to AP News. “Millions of children and their families, starting today, their lives are about to change for the better. And our country would be better off for it as well.”
Critics of the credits argue that the payments will incentivize unemployment because almost every family qualifies for the payments regardless if the parents have a job.
“Not only does Biden’s plan abandon incentives for marriage and requirements for work, but it will also destroy the child-support enforcement system as we know it by sending cash payments to single parents without ensuring child-support orders are established,” Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio said, according to AP News.
Some families have not received their payments however. Eligible families received their payments automatically through their bank accounts that the IRS has on file from filed tax returns, NBC News reported. Four to eight million families are not required to file tax returns or have not done so yet and will need to take extra action.
Some families will need to update their information with the IRS to receive their payments, but families that don't make enough income to file taxes are the most vulnerable to technology barriers.
The expanded tax credit is scheduled to end in December, but Biden has stated that he wants to extend it for four years with some Democrats calling for making the expansion permanent.