{"id":43152,"date":"2026-02-06T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-06T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newamerica.org\/insights\/beyond-outreach-making-tax-credits-easier-to-claim\/"},"modified":"2026-03-10T12:59:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T16:59:10","slug":"beyond-outreach-making-tax-credits-easier-to-claim","status":"publish","type":"insight","link":"https:\/\/www.newamerica.org\/insights\/beyond-outreach-making-tax-credits-easier-to-claim\/","title":{"rendered":"Beyond Outreach: Making Tax Credits Easier to Claim"},"author":14,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","issue_tax":[257],"topic_tax":[134,198,210],"program_tax":[138],"project_tax":[],"person_tax":[395],"podcast_show_tax":[],"insight_type":[3765],"fellowship_tax":[],"award":[],"class_list":["post-43152","insight","type-insight","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","insight_type-in-short"],"acf":{"details":{"hero_type":"small-image","abstract":"Systemic and practical barriers \u2014 more than awareness of tax credits \u2014 are the main reasons that people don\u2019t file taxes.","subheading":"One of our greatest poverty fighting tools is behind the tax system","read_time":"","watch_time":"","podcast_player":"","apple_podcast_link":"","spotify_podcast_link":"","podcast_link":null,"listen_time":"","youtube_id":"","":null,"featured_image":6917,"add_image_caption":false,"caption":"","pdf_version":null,"helper_taxonomies":{"issue_tax":[257],"topic_tax":[134,198,210],"program_tax":[138],"project_tax":false,"person_tax":[395],"fellowship_tax":false,"event_type":false,"location":false,"insight_type":[3765],"award":false,"podcast_show_tax":false,"person_type":false,"demographic_key":false,"survey_topic":false,"organization":false},"media_inquiry":false,"media_inquiry_title":"","media_inquiry_email":""},"page_layout":[{"acf_fc_layout":"layout_wysiwyg","_acfe_flexible_toggle":null,"component_wysiwyg":{"add_background_color":false,"content":"

The 2026 tax filing season is here, bringing with it a tax code that delivers the most effective anti-poverty initiative for children in the United States: refundable tax credits. Unlike most tax credits, refundable credits<\/a> are issued as cash refunds when they exceed the amount of taxes owed. Eligible filers who don\u2019t owe taxes receive the full amount of the credit as a refund.<\/p>\r\n

In 2024, the Census Bureau reported that refundable tax credits lifted approximately 6.4 million people out of poverty, and the majority of those people are under eighteen<\/a>. For the 2025 tax year, a family with three qualifying children could be eligible to receive more than $8,000<\/a> through the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and up to $5,100 of refundable Child Tax Credit (CTC)<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n

Federal eligibility requirements for both the EITC and the CTC have recently become more restrictive. Last year\u2019s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) disqualifies children from CTC eligibility when neither parent has a social security number (SSN). As a result, up to 2 million children who previously benefitted from the CTC will not do so this year<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n

The good news is that many states have expanded access: twenty nine states and the District of Columbia now offer their own refundable credits<\/a>. The dollar amounts are smaller than their Federal counterparts but are often available to a broader pool of people: nearly half of the twenty nine states allow filers without a Social Security number to receive refundable credits.<\/p>\r\n

Between the federal and state programs, there are significant amounts of money available, but critically, individuals need to file taxes<\/i> to get it. Year after year, up to 20% of people potentially eligible for the EITC<\/a> don\u2019t file taxes (often because they don\u2019t make enough to be legally required), or fail to claim the credits on their tax form.<\/p>\r\n\r\n

Why People Don\u2019t File<\/h2>\r\n

In 2025, NPL conducted a comprehensive survey to better understand the underlying issues that result in people not filing taxes. With a sample size of over 5,000 households, mostly from people with lower incomes who file taxes infrequently or not at all, the New Practice Lab released its report<\/a> Designed for Filing, Not for Families: Reimagining Tax Credit Delivery<\/i>, in May of last year. The report examined filing barriers individually, diving deeply into awareness, the fear of making mistakes, the cost of filing, and the complexity of the tax code. NPL also examined the survey data with a more holistic lens: when combined into a single list, which filing barriers did respondents cite the most frequently?<\/p>\r\n

As a new filing season kicks off, we\u2019re publishing the list to spotlight what many people in the tax space already know<\/a>: systemic and practical barriers \u2014 more than awareness of tax credits \u2014 are the main reasons that people don\u2019t file taxes, even if they stand to receive a refund. The top five challenges reported by survey respondents are all related to the act of filing taxes:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n

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