Many parents used the expanded child tax credit (CTC) to cover expenses such as food and rent. The program cushioned many families through the worst of the COVID-19 pandemic’s economic downturn.
Isreal Mosley is a single father to two sons and works for a nonprofit that advocates for public policies to support working families and their children. Isreal’s advocacy is driven by his own experiences trying to make ends meet while raising a family; over the course of the pandemic, rent skyrocketed in Isreal’s community of Waterville, Maine, straining the $1,900 in income that he brings home each month. When Isreal received the American Rescue Plan’s monthly child tax credit, it helped him afford rent and other necessary expenses, in addition to new school expenses, including clothes, for his boys. Across the country, the monthly CTC helped families such as Isreal’s make ends meet and provide necessities for their children. While the expanded CTC expired after December 2021, Isreal hopes that Congress can revisit the policy that greatly helped his family.
I’ve been working for years to try to make a better life for my kids, but the cost of rent and our household necessities has increased so much since the pandemic began. The monthly child tax credit meant more wiggle room for those monthly expenses. I wish we still had it.
Isreal Mosley
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Isreal Mosley pictured in July 2020. (Photo credit: Erin Towns)
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