offeringofletters.org

More than a dozen religious groups are urging assistance to low-income working families as an objective of federal tax policy as Congress debates legislation to address a series of tax cuts and tax credits that are set to expire this year.

Fact of the Day: To receive the Child Tax Credit, a family must earn a minimum income. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act lowered this income “threshold” to $3,000. If Congress does not extend this $3,000 income threshold (which expires at the end of the year), 6 million low-income children will lose the benefit completely, and 10 million children will receive a smaller credit.

Fact of the Day: Combined, the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit reduce the poverty rate by 20 percent and the child poverty rate by a third.

Fact of the Day: In 2007, more than 15 percent of tax filers received the Earned Income Tax Credit. Mississippi had the largest percentage of filers claim the federal Earned Income Tax Credit (27.9 percent); New Hampshire had the smallest (9.8 percent).

Fact of the Day: Programs such as the Earned Income Tax Credit that benefit low-income working people only accounted for $89 billion out of $760 billion, or about 12 percent, of the total amount spent through the tax code for all taxpayers in 2007.