abstract: 'Poverty during childhood raises a number of policy challenges. The

  earliest years are critical in terms of future cognitive and emotional

  development and early health outcomes, and have long-lasting

  consequences on future health. In this article child poverty in the

  United States is compared with a set of other developed countries. To

  the surprise of few, results show that child poverty is high in the

  United States. But why is poverty so much higher in the United States

  than in other rich nations? Among child poverty drivers, household

  composition and parent''s labor market participation matter a great deal.

  But these are not insurmountable problems. Many of these disadvantages

  can be overcome by appropriate public policies. For example, single

  mothers have a very high probability of poverty in the United States,

  but this is not the case in other countries where the provision of work

  support increases mothers'' labor earnings and together with strong

  public cash support effectively reduces child poverty. In this article

  we focus on the role and design of public expenditure to understand the

  functioning of the different national systems and highlight ways for

  improvements to reduce child poverty in the United States. We compare

  relative child poverty in the United States with poverty in a set of

  selected countries. The takeaway is that the United States under invests

  in its children and their families and in so doing this leads to high

  child poverty and poor health and educational outcomes. If a nation like

  the United States wants to decrease poverty and improve health and life

  chances for poor children, it must support parental employment and

  incomes, and invest in children''s futures as do other similar nations

  with less child poverty.'
affiliation: 'Smeeding, T (Corresponding Author), Univ Wisconsin, Inst Res Poverty,
  1180 Observ Dr, Madison, WI 53706 USA.

  Smeeding, Timothy, Univ Wisconsin, Inst Res Poverty, 1180 Observ Dr, Madison, WI
  53706 USA.

  Thevenot, Celine, OECD, Directorate Employment Labour \& Social Affairs, Social
  Policy Div, Paris, France.'
author: Smeeding, Timothy and Thevenot, Celine
author-email: smeeding@lafollette.wisc.edu
author_list:
- family: Smeeding
  given: Timothy
- family: Thevenot
  given: Celine
da: '2023-09-28'
doi: 10.1016/j.acap.2016.01.011
eissn: 1876-2867
files: []
issn: 1876-2859
journal: ACADEMIC PEDIATRICS
keywords: 'child poverty; cross-national; income supports; public expenditure;

  public services'
keywords-plus: POOR; ACHIEVEMENT; FAMILY; INCOME; CARE
language: English
month: APR
number: 3, S
number-of-cited-references: '35'
pages: S67-S75
papis_id: 412cc318f3ec7c4341936afab7970a7b
ref: Smeeding2016addressingchild
times-cited: '28'
title: 'Addressing Child Poverty: How Does the United States Compare With Other Nations?'
type: article
unique-id: WOS:000373417600014
usage-count-last-180-days: '3'
usage-count-since-2013: '27'
volume: '16'
web-of-science-categories: Pediatrics
year: '2016'