This month, West Virginia put out information about their new laws. It is planned to send out a new Child Tax Credit (CTC) payment. The goal of the CTC is to help families with kids.
Families would be able to get a personal income tax credit equal to half of the government child care tax credit through this plan. This bill is an important step toward giving parents in the state more cash help.
CTC update moves to the Senate with a 88-3 vote by the Delegates
By a vote of 88-3 on Monday, October 7th, the new bill was passed by a huge majority. The bill will now be decided on in the Senate before it is officially signed into law.
If the bill is passed, it will start to apply to incidents that happened before the beginning of 2024. This means that the year 2024 will be eligible to get the perks that come with the new law that is being considered.
Because of the new changes to the CTC, you will also get a personal income tax credit equal to 50% of your CTC. For instance, if you get $1,000 in CTC, you will be able to get an extra $500 tax credit on your West Virginia state income taxes.
A new plan from West Virginia Governor Jim Justice includes a $5 million investment to improve child care services in the state.
Critical time for child-care providers
It is because many child care workers are having a hard time making ends meet that the state is giving them extra help with child care. So far this year, 700 child care centers have had to close because of unstable funding and staffing shortages caused by low pay.
At the moment, West Virginia is covering the costs of child care centers through a nationally required enrollment-based subsidy program that will last until the end of the year.
“Families have a hard time getting child care all the time,” says Del. Kayla Young. “It is pretty pricey.” “There is still a lot of work to be done, and we need to help businesses, families, and employers,” she said.
Being able to pay for child care is important for families’ financial health because many families can not afford to lose the extra money that comes from having both parents work.
The bill still comes with challenges
Even though the bill has a lot of support, some members who are against it have made serious concerns about how long it will last. In one of the three votes against the bill, Del. Elias Coop-Gonzalez said he thought it would “favor one demographic over another.”
Another thing that the bill does is help with the bigger question of how to lower long-term child care costs. Instead, Coop-Gonzalez advised that the standard deduction be raised so that parents have more options and freedom in how they pay for child care.
Unfortunately, the bill will not do anything about the closing of child care centers, but the extra money would give parents more choices for finding other child care.
However, Coop-Gonzalez agrees that an extra income on top of what you are already getting might help some while not helping much more than what your main amount is already.
How and why child care has become so pricey might be the most important thing we need to ask ourselves. T
hese days, young people are much less likely to want to have kids because of the higher costs of child care and societal standards about how kids should be raised.
It is important to make sure that families can afford the costs of having kids so that they are more likely to have them.
Child care is still a worry for both present and future parents. The fact that West Virginia admitted they needed to make these conditions better might spur other states to do the same.
Also see:-Complete list of all changes to Social Security checks following the announced increase
