OUR OPINION
Poor children need tax help
THE ISSUE
As Hawaii's poverty level falls, the number of poor families with children remains high.
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HAWAII'S healthy economy is resulting in a
downturn in poverty, but too many families with young children are being left out. Census Bureau data show that the percentage of residents living in poverty has shrunk in recent years, but the number of families with children has remained about the same. The state should examine ways to help those families through tax policy.
While Hawaii families living in poverty dropped in 2003 to 10.8 percent in 2003 and 8.9 percent for the two-year period of 2003-4, the number of Hawaii's children under 5 years old and living in property remained at 17 percent in 2003, where it has hovered for the past decade. The poverty rate for all children up to 17 was 14.7 percent, according to the bureau.
Governor Lingle has called for helping many of those families by increasing the standard income tax deduction and raising the level at which families begin paying taxes from $11,600 to $13,900. However, the poorest of the poor -- two-parent families of four making less than $11,600 -- would be left behind because they don't earn enough income now to be taxed, and that would not change.
Reforms could benefit those families by including earned income tax credits based on federal credits available to working families with two or more children and incomes up to $34,000.
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