On December 15, 2022, Mormon Women for Ethical Government participated in a press conference in Washington, D.C., with an interfaith group of leaders and organizations working to ameliorate child poverty. The goal was to make a personal and faith-based case for the Child Tax Credit. For 25 years, child tax credits have proven to be an effective tool for reducing child poverty and providing significant support for growing families. MWEG member Steffani Thomas spoke about her family’s experience with the Child Tax Credit and shared how her support for this policy is linked to her personal faith.
The full text of Steffani’s remarks is found below. A link to a video recording of the full press conference can be found here (Steffani begins speaking at about 32:45).
My name is Steffani Thomas, and I live in Bristow, Virginia. I am a mother of four children and a member of Mormon Women for Ethical Government. I’m here today to share with you how the child tax credit has helped my family, and why I believe this bipartisan policy helps so many other hardworking American families as well.
My husband and I chose to start our family in our early twenties. When our first daughter was born, he was just finishing his bachelor’s degree and I was in my second year of teaching elementary school. Six months after her birth, we moved across the country so my husband could get a master’s degree. I chose to stay at home to raise our daughter and, over the next seven years, would have three more children while my husband worked and went to school to get a doctoral degree.
Family-friendly policies such as the child tax credit played an essential role in our ability to follow this path; we worked hard to be self-sufficient, and money was always tight, but those children were worth the sacrifice. Now our lives are much more comfortable, but I want to ensure that other children are able to have their basic needs and wants met by their parents. I support public policy that both encourages people to have children and then helps with their care — especially during this time of financial uncertainty and hardship for so many.
As a woman of faith, I am guided by the scriptures as I consider which policies will allow the largest number of God’s children to thrive and have self-determination and opportunities. In Leviticus, God commands: “And when you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not wholly reap the corners of thy field, neither shall you gather the gleanings of the harvest.”
Later, in the book of Ruth, we read the story of a woman trying to care for her family, who is fed because people had followed that commandment. Ruth is allowed to glean the remnants of the harvest in a good man’s field. When she thanks him for allowing her to gather food, he acknowledges that what he has is from God, and so he chooses to share a “full reward.”
As believers in a God who loves all children, we should try to ensure that all families can enjoy a full reward. The Child Tax Credit leaves just a little more of the harvest for parents to glean for their children. Parents who are working hard and just need a little extra — the last grain from the corner of the good man’s field.
This kind of generosity is good for the economy: We know that the dollars distributed through tax credits are spent quickly on necessities and flow back into the economy. Studies show that parents who receive this credit continue to work hard, and their children — able to attend school with full bellies — graduate high school at higher rates.
Generosity is a bipartisan virtue. Ever since the Child Tax Credit was recommended by a Reagan-era commission and implemented under the Clinton administration, it has been improved and increased by every president, regardless of his political party or who controlled congress. We all want families and children to thrive and reap the rewards of their labor. I am grateful for the opportunities it has given my family and am here today to advocate for a fully refundable Child Tax Credit so that other families will benefit as well.
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