INCOME & WORK SUPPORTS UPDATE
SEPTEMBER 2021
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Modernizing the TFP: One Step on the Journey Toward Food Sovereignty
The USDA’s recent update to the Thrifty Food Plan (TFP) has led to an average 27 percent increase in benefits to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or roughly $36. While significant, Parker Gilkesson encourages the USDA to reimagine the nutritional standard over the next five years: “The USDA should create a viable plan to end the food apartheid in neighborhoods experiencing low incomes, and partner with local organizers and community members to understand how they would like to access food.”
Read More [[link removed]]

25 Years of Immigrant Exclusion from Public Benefits
Access to food, cash assistance, health care, and housing are pathways to economic justice that everyone deserves—no matter their citizenship status. However, federal restrictions enacted 25 years ago in the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA) interfere with the ability of immigrants to secure critical benefits with significant consequences to their and their families’ wellbeing.
Read More [[link removed] ]

Administrative Burdens Exacerbate Inequities and Must Be Reduced
“Because of the systemic and historical aspects of public benefits eligibility — particularly that it’s means-tested and people must prove their ‘worthiness’— administrative burdens fall more heavily on people accessing public benefit programs. A family with Medicaid for their health insurance faces significantly different barriers to enrollment than my family does enrolling in employer-sponsored insurance,” writes Suzanne Wikle.
Read More [hhttps://www.clasp.org/blog/administrative-burdens-exacerbate-inequities-and-must-be-reduced]

In the News
August 21, 2021 | CNBC
Signing up late for the $3,000 child tax credit? Here’s what it means for the remaining payments [[link removed]]

August 18, 2021 | Moguldom Nation
Joe Biden To Increase Food Stamp Benefits By 25 Percent: 3 Things To Know [[link removed]]

August 8, 2021 | Inside Sources
The Expanded Child Tax Credit Is Changing Lives. Congress Should Make It Permanent. [[link removed]]

August 11, 2021 | Mathematica |
Supporting Informal Child Care Providers Is Key to Advancing Equity [[link removed]]

IWS Update
In August, both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives passed a budget resolution setting the stage for transformative legislation that will address the needs of millions of families, children, women, and young adults of color and with low incomes who have been left behind for too long. This resolution enables Congress to use reconciliation, a process that bypasses the filibuster and allows legislation to be enacted with a simple majority. The framework provides for historic investments in child care and paid family leave, extension of the improvements to the Child Tax Credit (CTC) and Earned Income Tax Credit, a pathway to citizenship for millions of immigrants, and more.


House committees are beginning to mark-up their portions of the bill this week, with the goal of moving the bill by the end of September. But none of this is guaranteed, and it is critical to mobilize this month so that these provisions are not left out of the bill. Our partners at the Children’s Defense Fund developed an online advocacy hub [[link removed]] where you can send an email to or call your members of Congress, urging them to include an inclusive, permanent expansion of the CTC in the budget reconciliation bill. The Economic Security Project is also organizing congressional office visits on September 15—the day that the third round of CTC advance monthly payments will be distributed. You can sign up here [[link removed]]. We will continue to keep you posted on similar opportunities. 

Key Blog Posts and Publications
August 24 , 2021 | Darrel Thompson and Ashley Burnside | No More Double Punishments: Lifting the Ban on SNAP and TANF for People with Prior Felony Drug Convictions (Update) [[link removed]]

August 11, 2021 | Tiffany Ferrette | Supporting Immigrant Providers and Families Through Child Care Relief Funds [[link removed] ]

August 9, 2021 | Jacquelyn Sullivan | A Debt to be Paid: Reparations and a New Deal for Youth [[link removed]]

August 19 |Elizabeth Lower-Basch and Ashley Burnside | TANF 101: Work Participation Rate (Update) [[link removed]]

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What We're Reading
SCALAWAG | Hurricane Ida: How to get and give help on the Gulf Coast [[link removed]]

THE ATLANTIC | Will the Child Tax Credit End Traditional Welfare? [[link removed]]

OFFICE OF THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR PLANNING AND EVALUATION | Equity Considerations for Delivering Human Services Virtually [[link removed]]

THE INTERCEPT | Supreme Court Ended Eviction Moratorium, but Pandemic Has Shown Road Map for Fighting Back [[link removed]]

URBAN INSTITUTE | 2021 Poverty Projections: Assessing the Impact of Benefits and Stimulus Measures [[link removed]]

CHILDREN'S DEFENSE FUND | TANF at 25: A Reflection and Reckoning [[link removed]]

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