Elevator pitch
The earned income tax credit provides important benefits to low-income families with children in the US. At an annual cost of about $60 billion, it increases the incomes of such families while encouraging parents to work more by subsidizing their incomes. But low-income adults without children and non-custodial parents receive only very low payments under the program, providing them with little income benefits or work incentives. Many of these adults are low-income young men whose wages and employment rates have been declining for years and who might benefit substantially from expanded eligibility for the earned income tax credit.
![US employment has declined substantially among less educated men, ages 30–50](http://www.ecmna114.com/wol/uploads/articles/184/images/IZAWOL.184.ga.png)
Key findings
Pros
The earned income tax credit boosts income and work effort among low-income parents and contributed to the steep rise in employment among single mothers in the 1990s.
Expanding the tax credit to low-income childless adults would raise income and work effort among a group whose earnings and employment have fallen substantially in recent decades and who now get little assistance from the program.
The statistical evidence shows that work effort among low-income adults is sensitive to their net wages, and an earned income tax credit for childless adults would raise their net wages.
Cons
The earned income tax credit costs about $60 billion a year, and extending it to childless adults would add to those costs.
Strong evidence is lacking on how effective such a program would be at raising income and employment among childless adults.
Expanding the tax credit to childless low-income adults might discourage marriage and reduce work effort among childless adults whose credits are phasing out.
Low-income men with child support orders or criminal records face additional barriers and disincentives in finding work and might need help to find and keep employment.