Child tax credit 2023 (taxes filed in 2024)
For 2023, the child tax credit is worth $2,000 per qualifying dependent child if your modified adjusted gross income (MAGI) is $400,000 or below (married filing jointly) or $200,000 or below (all other filers). The refundable portion, also known as the additional child tax credit, is worth up to $1,600.
If your MAGI exceeds the above limits, your credit gets reduced by $50 for each $1,000 that your income exceeds the threshold.
At a time of running deficits and other major funding shortfalls, why in the world would we be giving tax credits to families earning $400,000 per year, or $300,000, or $200,000?
Even the temporary American Rescue Plan had a married income limit of $150,000. The median household income in the US is about $75,000 per year.
I don’t recall anything but a personal exception for each child when we were raising in our children, no tax credit.
Then we have another child tax credit with this claim.
It is well-established that the temporary Child Tax Credit (CTC) expansion that President Biden signed into law helped drive child poverty to a record low of 5.2 percent in 2021, and that the failure to extend the expanded CTC caused child poverty to spike in 2022.
The White House
Well established? By whom?
If you give a family living just below the poverty level a refundable tax credit and that boosts it above the poverty level, the family is technically out of poverty at that point.
However, there is no way of knowing where that money went, how it was used or if it benefit the children in any way. Labeling it a Child Tax Credit is just politics.
QUINNSCOMMENTARY 
Keep in mind this credit has been in effect for most of this century, it’s not something Biden can take credit for even though it’s touted on a White House press release.
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I thought $400,000 was a high threshold also, but apparently that is only two percent of the population, and they earn twenty-five percent of total income. Income disparity is huge in this country, and income taxes should be much more progressive.
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The concept of lifting the child out of poverty via the tax credit comes from the definition of a child or children living in poverty based on family income. Pull that income over the line and the child gets counted as out of poverty. Is the child magically transformed into better conditions, no, but it may help. I suspect it is more of a talking point the welfare industry uses to say look what we have done.
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I think it is good fiscal policy that can help stem the falling birthrate and also help significantly with the increased cost of raising children that have spiked in the past two decades. Yes, you can argue it is a personal choice to have children, but a higher birthrate and less children in poverty both benefit society in the long run.
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Wouldn’t any bill signed for a tax change in 2021 effect income earned that year not the prior year–they are saying record low child poverty rates in 2021 are because of what they did after inauguration day 2021? That would be a first!
Don’t be surprised by this type of thinking as they are buying votes wherever they can–see the student loan deficit adding edict. Of course $400,000 is outrageous–helping poor folks makes some good sense–if a couple earns $400,000 please pay for your own children’s needs. Again, just buying votes at a cost our children and grandchildren will pay for.
Remember- the more money you give these folks (raise our taxes!!) the more they will want. They are never satisfied!
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