Earned Income Tax Credit Claiming Across Zip Codes

“The goal of this brief is to provide a fresh look at the role of the EITC by utilizing zip-code level data on taxes and demographics” (p.2). The authors explore “the relationship between EITC claiming rates (i.e., the percent of tax returns receiving the EITC) and poverty rates, the demographic characteristics of zip codes with high EITC claiming rates, and the variation in EITC claiming rates and average EITC amount cross counties” (p.2).

(Abstractor: Author)

“Utilizing zip code level data, we identify characteristics most correlated with the share of families receiving the EITC. We find that people living in high-poverty zip codes receive the EITC at higher rates than people in zip codes with low poverty rates. Likely as a result of the correlation between race and poverty, counties with more EITC recipients have higher concentrations of African-Americans, and counties with high shares of EITC recipients are overwhelmingly located in the Southeast” (p.7). (Abstractor: Author)

• Last Updated:
• Created:
• Resource Publication Date: 2014
• Author(s): Harris, Benjamin H. and Parker, Lucie
• Organizational Author(s): Tax Policy Center
• Funding Source: Brookings Institution, Urban Institute
• Resource Availability: Publicly available
• Posted by: Wesley Peterson
• Posted in: Workforce System Strategies