Child tax credit utilization in immigrant households: a focus on child investment and college funds

In 2021, the Child Tax Credit (CTC) was temporarily expanded, offering benefits of up to $3,600 per child under age 6 and $3,000 per child ages 6 to 17. While previous research has examined general trends in CTC utilization and impact, this study seeks to fill an important gap in the literature by investigating how immigrant households used their expanded CTC payments. Leveraging a survey of over 1,700 CTC recipients, we use logistic regression to investigate how immigrant households used their CTC payments. Our findings reveal that, for the most prevalent expenditure categories, including essential items, routine expenses, emergency savings, purchasing more food for one’s family, and paying down debt, both immigrant and non-immigrant households exhibited similar usage patterns. However, relative to their non-immigrant counterparts, immigrant households were more inclined to direct their payments towards child-related investments, particularly saving for their child(ren)’s college education. These findings contribute meaningful insights into potential benefits of policy interventions like the CTC among immigrant and mixed-status families.