And On The Other Hand

And On The Other Hand

The Missing Numbers in the Child Poverty Rate

If you were as sloppy on your federal tax return is as the Federal government is in reporting the child poverty rate, you would be

Picture of Barry J. Klazura

Barry J. Klazura

October 19, 2022

If you were as sloppy on your federal tax return is as the Federal government is in reporting the child poverty rate, you would be carted off to jail. How is it possible for the census bureau to exclude nearly two trillion dollars in transfer payments (such as food stamps. Children’s Health Insurance, rent subsidies, etc.) which inflates the percent of children living in poverty? Fifty years ago, the average family with children received about $10,000 in subsidies (welfare); today that number stands at over $45,000.

The problem with how the numbers are reported is not only that they are inaccurate but that they create a rationale for increasing taxes to reach an unreachable goal and whose cost falls disproportionately on the shrinking middle class. While Obama Care was created and openly talked about as a wealth transfer program, the under reporting of transfers in a program such as child poverty is more insidious. The only real achievement of this type of misreporting is the creation and maintenance of an ever-growing government bureaucracy which has no vested interest in reporting the accurate numbers.

Click on the link below for the full story.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/child-poverty-data-are-missing-something-refundable-tax-credit-tranfser-payments-census-estimates-household-income-11663689293?page=1

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Written by Barry J. Klazura

Writer, historian, and financial advisor. I studied Political Science at Loyola University Chicago and have spent a lifetime reading history. I write because the mainstream will not ask the hard questions. 

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