Source: United States Senator for Florida Marco Rubio
Biden’s Child Allowance Made Tax Season Worse
U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL)
April 20, 2022
RealClear Florida
…Over the last few weeks, many Americans came to the shocking realization that instead of getting a refund – a refund they’d been counting on to offset the last 12 months of rising prices – they would owe money to the federal government. Why? Because President Joe Biden’s now-expired government child allowance disrupted a longstanding tax benefit.
For the year of 2021, President Biden replaced the child tax credit for working parents with a government child allowance for every parent, including those not working. The benefit was intended to provide monthly payments for every child in a residence….
The decision to set up a new monthly payment regime midway through the year meant that many taxpayers unknowingly used half the refund they were expecting to see when they filed their taxes…. That’s not all. President Biden’s plan appears to have confused Washington bureaucrats, who overpaid a significant number of Americans. Some households didn’t have to pay that free money back, but others will be hounded by the IRS until they break even….
It should have been obvious from the beginning that giving American households with no working adults over $6,000 in cash welfare payments was neither pro-work nor pro-family. We’ve seen the workforce shortages and out-of-control inflation that resulted – consequences that are hurting everyone, but especially low-income parents. And now we’re seeing the program disrupt the lives of the very people it was supposed to help….
Fortunately, there’s a better way of helping families. In 2017, I worked with Ivanka Trump and Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) to double the federal child tax credit…. Congress should expand the child tax credit for working parents again, from $2,000 to $3,500 (and $4,500 for young children). This would put more dollars in working parents’ pockets, strengthening American families during an era of rising prices and global insecurity….
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