We can do more

Child poverty must be addressed

This week the Annie E. Casey Foundation released its annual Kids Count Data Book, and the news is not good for Arkansas children. We ranked 45th in overall child well-being, a ranking that has remained relatively unchanged over the past decade. Arkansas dropped from 36th to 47th in economic well-being, a key area of concern for Arkansas policymakers.

Ordinarily, we are more concerned about long-term trends in the Data Book than whether our rankings go up or down a few spots. But when your state’s ranking in economic well-being drops 11 spots in one year, it merits attention. We are especially concerned that 27 percent of Arkansas children, or more than one in four, still live in poverty. That’s 188,000 children. Even with the recent economic recovery, it’s clear Arkansas has a long way to go in ensuring that every child has the resources and opportunities they need to lead healthy, productive lives and to realize their full potential.

The news has reported a lot lately about Arkansas’ success in reducing unemployment to historic lows. While that’s good news, will it eventually raise family incomes enough to substantially reduce child poverty? That hasn’t happened yet and is not reflected in this year’s Data Book. We have reason to be skeptical. If we have learned anything since the last recession, it’s that the gains from the nation’s “recovery” have far too often benefited corporations and wealthy stockholders and left out the millions of low- and middle-income families struggling to find jobs that pay enough to meet their family’s needs.

What can Arkansas do to reduce child poverty and improve the state’s child well-being ranking? First, our policymakers must acknowledge that child poverty is a problem that impacts all of us. They must stop blaming the poor, a trend evident in much of the punitive legislation introduced during the recent legislative session. We must elect policymakers who, regardless of their party affiliation, are willing to tackle child poverty headon; policymakers who care more about enacting public policy based on what the research and data show is good for children rather than on blind partisan ideology.

We must get off the income-taxcut merry-go-round that has devastated state budgets and hindered states’ ability to invest in their children, their work force, and the infrastructure that is needed to promote real, long-term economic growth. Need examples? Look no further than the failed “grand experiment” in Kansas or the recent budget debacles in nearby Oklahoma and Louisiana.

Any future tax cuts should be focused on boosting local economies from the bottom up, such as a refundable state earned income tax credit (EITC) for low-income workers, a strategy that has proven successful at the national level and in many states in reducing child poverty. The low-income tax-rate cut Arkansas passed during the last legislative session—while a better alternative than competing proposals to cut taxes for the wealthy—did little to help many low-income working families who already made too little to pay state income taxes. A state EITC would be a major step in the right direction.

We must invest in strategies that will improve the ability of all children—regardless of their family income, their race and ethnicity, or where they live—to compete for better-paying jobs in the future. This starts with ensuring every child can read at grade level by the end of the third grade, a key milestone in a child’s development and future educational success. This includes investing in high quality pre-K to give our children a good start, high-quality after-school and summer programs so kids don’t have to relearn information after the summer months, and doing more to reduce absenteeism and keep our kids in the classroom where they can learn.

We must also do more to give hope to vulnerable children whose lives have already been impacted by poverty. This includes building on Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s $27 million increase for the state’s child welfare system to protect abused and neglected children.

It also means stopping the incarceration of children in juvenile prisons—where they often come out worse off than when they went in— and instead investing in community programs that are more effective and more affordable than locking our children up.

Finally, the Arkansas Congressional delegation must resist President Trump’s agenda that will gut healthcare coverage for 23 million Americans, a radical Robin Hood-in-reverse strategy that cuts the federal budget by $4.3 trillion over the next decade and slashes basic assistance and investments in low- and middle-income families; and a $6 trillion tax-cut plan for the wealthy and the most profitable corporations that does little to help low- and middle-income families and their children. His proposals, even if only partially adopted, pose an unprecedented threat to the well-being of Arkansas children and families.