In 2021, families saw the benefits of federal investments in their well-being. The Child Tax Credit, improved nutrition assistance, and other benefits aimed at helping people cope with the economic dislocations of the pandemic worked to lift millions of people out of poverty. The Census Bureau’s Supplemental Poverty Measure, which takes many federal benefits into account in calculating poverty rates, found that 9.6 million fewer people were poor because of low-income tax credits, and 8.9 million people were protected from poverty by the stimulus payments sent out. Other forms of assistance also lifted millions out of poverty, including SNAP and school lunch food aid (3.4 million) and housing subsidies (2.4 million).
Archives: Voices
High School Voter Registration Week is approaching!
When it comes to young people turning out to vote, there is bad news, good news, and more good news.
CHN’s latest Human Needs Report: FY23 Appropriations Update, Inflation Reduction Act, and more
CHN just released another edition of the Human Needs Report. Read on for a comprehensive update on the FY23 appropriations process, including highlights of what is happening in the Senate, along with news about the Inflation Reduction Act.
CHN’s COVID-19 Watch: Tracking Hardship, September 2, 2022
The back-to-school edition. Kids are returning to classrooms, but we find students, teachers, and schools themselves in a pandemic-related crisis. For students, the damage that has been done became more apparent than ever this past Thursday, September 1, when new data revealed just how big a hit students took academically during the pandemic’s first two years. New test results from the National Assessment for Educational Progress, often called the “nation’s report card,” showed students of all income levels and ethnicities on average fared much worse in early 2022 than they did in early 2020, just before the pandemic. But students from families with low incomes and Black and Hispanic students fared even worse.
Biden’s student debt relief is a big deal
We’re told that higher education is one of the best ways to overcome poverty. But for many indebted borrowers, it’s been just the opposite. Since 1980, the cost of college has increased at nearly 9 times the rate of paychecks. If you’re poor and don’t join the military, land a full scholarship, or gain a mysterious wealthy benefactor, you have one option: borrowing against your future prospects.
An historic action: Advocates applaud Biden announcement on student debt relief
Many human needs advocates are applauding President Biden’s decision this week to forgive up to $20,000 in student debt – an executive order that would completely wipe out student debt for 20 million Americans. Biden’s order appears carefully tailored to target those who need the most help. His action would provide up to $10,000 in relief for all holders of student debt, and up to $20,000 for Pell Grant recipients. Only individuals who earn less than $125,000 or couples earning less than $250,000 a year would qualify for either level of loan forgiveness.
For long COVID patients waiting for help from Congress: ‘It’s been silence – crickets’
U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, it seems, is having trouble getting his colleagues to listen to him. The Virginia Democrat first contracted COVID-19 in March 2020, part of the first major wave of Americans to get the virus. Now, almost two and a half years later, he continues to exhibit symptoms. In his case, he suffers from nerve sensitivity, or a feeling “as if every nerve ending in my body has had five cups of coffee,” as he told Politico.
CHN’s COVID-19 Watch: Tracking Hardship, August 19, 2022
The health care savings edition. The pandemic’s flames rage on, with nearly 100,000 new cases in the U.S. every day and nearly 500 deaths. But there is good news to report. President Biden this week signed the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022, which will lower prescription drug and other health care costs for millions of Americans. The legislation covers other things of tremendous consequence – the most significant U.S. response to climate change ever and making corporations pay more of their fair share with a 15 percent corporate tax rate, for example. But the health care provisions contained in the bill are historic too.
Biden’s inflation bill is (mostly) good news for people and the planet
President Biden and the Democrats are celebrating the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, a stripped down version of the Build Back Better agenda. The new bill will help reduce inflation, address climate change, and ease economic hardship — a little, over time, and with conditions. But that’s still a big deal.
President Biden signs the historic Inflation Reduction Act: Biden Administration scores a victory for people over profit
In the rollercoaster ride to this day when President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act, it seemed all too possible that no law would reach the President’s desk. Members of the Coalition on Human Needs applaud the victory that the President’s signature represents: the unflagging efforts by the Administration and members of Congress to make progress because they recognized that failure would be measured in preventable sickness, hardship, and growing environmental threats.
With House passage, President Biden can sign the Inflation Reduction Act into law: Historic live-saving steps we must build upon
The Inflation Reduction Act provides extremely important help. It will reduce hardship, improve health, and start to protect our future. But we’ve got more to do, both to make sure the law fulfills its promises, and to take up the unfinished business that we owe ourselves, our children, and our grandchildren.
Remembering Bill Collins
I learned this week about the passing of a remarkable man. Bill Collins died recently in a car accident at the age of 87. Bill was a popular former mayor of Norwalk, Connecticut. In his hometown, tributes have poured in celebrating Bill’s legacy of revitalizing the city’s downtown, professionalizing its civil service, and championing affordable housing over his four terms in office. But I got to know Bill because of the remarkable work he did after retiring from public service.