Child poverty in the U.S. could be cut in half over the next 10 years, according to a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. NASEM estimates that current levels of child poverty , in addition to the individual and community suffering, cost the U.S. between $800 billion and $1.1 trillion a year, due to lower productivity when poor children become adults and increased costs due to higher crime and poor health. Possible fixes offered by NASEM include one path toward expanding existing programs (EITC, SNAP, housing assistance, etc.) that encourage work but also provide direct assistance, or another plan that would expand the earned income and child care tax credits, raise the minimum wage, eliminate restrictions on immigrant families' access to government aid, and provide a $2,700 yearly allowance for each child. Both plans are expensive - last least $90 billion, but both would create hundreds of thousands of jobs and cut child poverty in half. About 15 million children in the United States - 21% of all children - live in families with incomes below the federal poverty threshold , a measurement that has been shown to underestimate the needs of families . 

The Annie E. Casey Foundations reports that between 2005 and 2017, 46 out of 50 states saw an uptick in the percentage of kids who were living in families that receive public assistance. This trend toward public assistance also holds true at the national level. In 2005, nearly one in five of kids across the country - more than 13.8 million children total - lived in a family that received public assistance. Today, one in four kids in America - nearly 18.6 million children - lives in such a family. State level data are here .