Budget Share for Kids

by KYW's Dr. Marciene Mattleman

While overall spending on children’s issues has increased 1.4% in the federal budget, over the past five years, in real terms, children have lost ground.  Although non-defense spending grew at 10 times that rate, the children’s share declined 11%.

This drop is a continuation of a trend of a steady decline by 23% since 1960, according to a book recently released by First Focus.

During the last half decade, spending for children’s education, welfare and youth training have been hit especially hard.  It’s unfortunate with so many low achieving kids that the President’s budget proposal for 2009 continues in this direction.

One example from that budget deals with children’s health programs, where the budget increase is 2.2%; but discretionary spending in this area would drop by 12% from 2008 levels.

According to the Children’s Defense Fund, 9 million children are not covered by health insurance.

We need to remind our legislators that for every dollar a taxpayer pays, forty-two cents goes to the military, with only 4.4 cents going toward education, training and social service costs.