The loss of the 2021 expanded Child Tax Credit deepened economic pessimism

By most standard measures, the U.S. economy was strong heading into 2024: Unemployment was low and wages were rising.

按照大多数标准衡量标准，美国经济在 2024 年之前表现强劲：失业率较低，工资不断上涨。

Yet Americans kept telling pollsters they felt terrible about it.

然而，美国人不断告诉民意调查者，他们对此感到很糟糕。

The gap between the data and the mood became large enough to earn a nickname—the “ vibecession .” And the disconnect has persisted.

数据和情绪之间的差距变得足够大，以至于赢得了一个绰号——“震动”。而且这种脱节现象仍然存在。

Unemployment still hovers around 4%, layoffs are historically low, and wages are generally outpacing inflation, yet Americans continue to feel down on the economy.

失业率仍徘徊在4%左右，裁员处于历史低位，工资增长普遍超过通胀，但美国人仍然对经济感到沮丧。

Why?

为什么？

One important explanation is affordability: Rising prices due to inflation and the cost of borrowing .

一个重要的解释是负担能力：通货膨胀和借贷成本导致价格上涨。

But a second important explanation has been overlooked: In early 2022, a temporary benefit that gave families with children hundreds of dollars per month expired.

但第二个重要的解释却被忽视了：2022 年初，一项每月为有孩子的家庭提供数百美元的临时福利到期。

In new research , co-authored with Melody Harvey , we show that after this benefit expired, sentiment fell much further for families with children than for childless households, and further still for families with multiple children.

在与梅洛迪·哈维 (Melody Harvey) 合着的新研究中，我们表明，在这项福利到期后，有孩子的家庭的情绪比无孩子的家庭下降得更多，而有多个孩子的家庭的情绪下降得更厉害。

For millions of families, the pessimism wasn’t a vibe.

对于数百万家庭来说，悲观情绪并不存在。

A check had stopped coming.

支票不再寄来了。

The 2021 Child Tax Credit (CTC) expansion was one of the largest one-year increases in aid to low- and middle-income families in U.S. history.

2021 年儿童税收抵免 (CTC) 扩大是美国历史上对中低收入家庭援助增幅最大的一年之一。

The credit climbed from $2,000 to $3,600 per child under age six and $3,000 per child aged six to 17.

每名 6 岁以下儿童的抵免额从 2,000 美元增至 3,600 美元，每名 6 岁至 17 岁儿童的抵免额从 3,000 美元增至 3,000 美元。

Importantly, the expanded credit was fully refundable, so the lowest-income families who owed little or no federal income tax could receive it in full.

重要的是，扩大的信贷可全额退还，因此只欠很少或根本不欠联邦所得税的最低收入家庭可以全额收到。

The CTC expansion helped reduce child poverty to a record-low 5.2%.

CTC 的扩张帮助将儿童贫困率降低至历史最低的 5.2%。

In 2022, the CTC reverted to its smaller, pre-2021 form, and child poverty soared from 5.2% to 12.4%.

2022 年，CTC 恢复到 2021 年之前的较小规模，儿童贫困率从 5.2% 飙升至 12.4%。

Other pandemic-era supports (including stimulus payments and expanded unemployment insurance) had also helped reduce poverty in 2020 and 2021, and their subsequent absence contributed to the 2022 rebound (Figure 1).

大流行时期的其他支持（包括刺激支付和扩大失业保险）也有助于减少 2020 年和 2021 年的贫困，而随后这些支持的缺失促成了 2022 年的反弹（图 1）。

The size of the loss varied sharply across families: The poorest families lost $3,000 per child in annual income—$3,600 per child for children under six—while many higher-income households were unaffected.

不同家庭的损失规模差别很大：最贫困的家庭每个孩子的年收入损失 3,000 美元——六岁以下的孩子每个孩子损失 3,600 美元——而许多高收入家庭却没有受到影响。

That variation allows comparison of families who lost substantial income with those who lost little or nothing.

这种差异可以将失去大量收入的家庭与失去很少或没有收入的家庭进行比较。

The University of Michigan Index of Consumer Sentiment shows that mood fell across the board after early 2022, but not evenly (Figure 2).

密歇根大学消费者信心指数显示，2022 年初之后消费者信心全面下降，但幅度不均（图 2）。

Sentiment among childless households dropped by about 9 points.

无子女家庭的情绪下降了约 9 个百分点。

Among families with children the decline was steeper and deepened as the number of children increased, falling by almost 20 points among families with three or more children, a decline equal to about a fifth of the index’s pre-pandemic level.

在有孩子的家庭中，随着孩子数量的增加，下降幅度更大、更深，有三个或更多孩子的家庭下降了近 20 个百分点，降幅相当于该指数大流行前水平的约五分之一。

The pattern suggests that the loss of the expanded CTC drove the decline in sentiment.

该模式表明，扩大的 CTC 的损失导致了情绪的下降。

The drop was concentrated among lower-income families, who lost the most benefits.

下降主要集中在低收入家庭，他们失去的福利最多。

For every $1,000 reduction in CTC benefits, sentiment fell by about 1.7 points.

CTC 福利每减少 1,000 美元，情绪就会下降约 1.7 个百分点。

But sentiment among higher-income families with children—who lost little or no CTC benefits—declined about as much as it did among households without children.

但有孩子的高收入家庭——他们几乎没有或没有失去 CTC 福利——的情绪下降幅度与无孩子家庭的情绪一样低。

Families were not simply feeling worse about their own finances.

家庭不仅仅是对自己的财务状况感到更糟糕。

Our research shows that losing CTC income also made families more pessimistic about the broader economy, their risk of job loss, and the government’s economic policies.

我们的研究表明，失去 CTC 收入也会让家庭对整体经济、失业风险以及政府的经济政策更加悲观。

We also consider other factors that could potentially explain the decline in sentiment.

我们还考虑了可能解释情绪下降的其他因素。

Other pandemic-era income supports had ended well before early 2022, making them unlikely to explain the sharp change at that point.

其他大流行时期的收入支持早在 2022 年初就结束了，这使得它们不太可能解释当时的急剧变化。

Inflation and rising borrowing costs are another possibility if they hit families with children especially hard.

如果通货膨胀和借贷成本上升对有孩子的家庭造成特别严重的打击，那么这也是另一种可能性。

But our results are essentially unchanged after accounting for inflation, mortgage and auto-loan rates, and the federal funds rate, and allowing for the possibility that these factors affected larger families differently.

但考虑到通货膨胀、抵押贷款和汽车贷款利率以及联邦基金利率，并考虑到这些因素对大家庭产生不同影响的可能性，我们的结果基本上没有变化。

Higher borrowing costs weakened sentiment among all household types, but do not explain why sentiment fell more sharply among families with children.

较高的借贷成本削弱了所有类型家庭的情绪，但并不能解释为什么有孩子的家庭情绪下降得更厉害。

The start of monthly payments in July 2021 was associated with higher sentiment, especially among lower-income families, but these estimates are smaller and much less precise.

2021 年 7 月开始每月付款与较高的情绪相关，尤其是在低收入家庭中，但这些估计值较小且不太精确。

It’s harder to isolate the introduction of the expanded CTC since the March 2021 stimulus checks arrived just a few months before expanded CTC payments began.

由于 2021 年 3 月的刺激支票是在扩大的 CTC 支付开始前几个月才发放的，因此很难孤立扩大的 CTC 的引入。

The expiration of the expanded CTC is an important piece of the puzzle of why consumer sentiment remained so weak even as many economic indicators improved.

扩大后的CTC到期是解释为什么尽管许多经济指标有所改善但消费者信心仍然如此疲软的一个重要原因。

It accounts for most of the extra decline in sentiment among households with children, and for about 15% of the early-2024 “vibecession,” the gap between actual sentiment and what fundamentals alone would predict.

它是有孩子家庭情绪额外下降的主要原因，也是 2024 年初“情绪衰退”（实际情绪与基本面预测之间的差距）约 15% 的原因。

The broader lesson extends beyond the CTC.

更广泛的教训不只是反恐委员会。

The effects of temporary benefits may not end when payments do.

当付款结束时，临时福利的影响可能不会结束。

When the expanded CTC expired, affected families were not just poorer.

当扩大的 CTC 到期时，受影响的家庭不仅变得更加贫困。

They reported more pessimism about the broader economy and about government itself.

他们对更广泛的经济和政府本身更加悲观。

For policymakers, that means evaluating temporary programs should include not only what they provide while in place, but also what happens when they disappear.

对于政策制定者来说，这意味着评估临时计划不仅应包括它们在实施时提供的内容，还应包括它们消失后会发生什么。