Expanding the EITC to Help More Low-Wage Workers

“In recent years, numerous policy groups, members of Congress, and others have called for expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit for workers without qualifying children, e.g, low-earning single and married workers without children, noncustodial parents, and parents with adult independent children. The American Clean Energy and Security Act, passed by the House of Representatives on June 26, would (among many other things) expand the EITC for these workers… The EITC plays an essential role as both a work incentive and a means of raising the incomes of the lowest-earning workers. But the current EITC provides little help to some groups that would benefit from increased workforce participation and that are hurt due to low or declining earnings for less-skilled workers…This brief explained the importance of expanding the EITC for workers without qualifying children; described the criteria that should guide such an expansion; described and commended the House approach; and described changes that…would improve it” (p.1-2). (Abstractor: Author)

“…[T]here is a strong need to subsidize the earnings of less-educated workers in the US, and that an expansion of the EITC for workers without qualifying children would help to accomplish this goal. The House approach to expanding the EITC for workers without qualifying children in the energy bill would be an important step forward. But Congress should go further and ensure that the EITC for workers without qualifying children has strong work incentives, provides a significant earnings subsidy to lower-earning workers, and is effectively coordinated with the Making Work Pay Credit. This would improve the incentives of less-educated workers to be attached to the labor market and would subsidize the earnings and reduce the poverty of very low earners” (p.12). (Abstractor: Author)

• Last Updated:
• Created:
• Resource Publication Date: 2009
• Author(s): Edelman, Peter; Greenberg, Mark; Holt, Steve; Holzer, Harry
• Organizational Author(s): Georgetown Center on Poverty, Inequality and Public Policy, Georgetown University
• Funding Source: Funding source not identified
• Resource Availability: Publicly available
• Posted by: Wesley Peterson
• Posted in: Workforce System Strategies