Seventeen states, including Rhode Island, offer child care tax credits to employers that assist employees with access to child care centers. (Rawpixel/Getty image)
Originally published by The 19th
As efforts to expand the child tax credit and provide paid family leave have stalled at the federal level, states are increasingly incentivizing private employers to step in and fill one of the other most painful gaps for working parents: child care.
According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 17 states offer child care tax credits to “employers that operate or contract out child care services for their employees.” These states are Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Maryland, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia.
Eric Syverson, a senior policy specialist in the National Conference of State Legislatures’ fiscal affairs program, said the conversation about a child tax credit at the federal level is driving a bipartisan consensus around finding ways in the tax code to help parents and families in need of child care services.