Dolores Acevedo-Garcia (
Pamela K. Joshi is a senior research scientist at the Institute for Child, Youth, and Family Policy, Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Brandeis University.
Health Aff (Millwood). 2021 Jul;40(7):1099-1107. doi: 10.1377/hlthaff.2021.00206.
Since the enactment of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, known as "welfare reform," in 1996, US social policy has increasingly stratified immigrants by legality, extending eligibility exclusions, benefit limitations, and administrative burdens not only to undocumented immigrants but also to lawful permanent residents and US citizens in immigrant families. This stratification is a form of structural discrimination, which is a social determinant of health. Children in immigrant families, most of whom are US citizens, have not been able to fully realize the benefits from social safety-net programs-including the 2020 Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act stimulus payments. Policy deliberations over pandemic recovery, the equity focus of the Biden administration, and proposals to address child poverty provide an opportunity to reexamine immigrant exclusions, restrictions, and administrative burdens in public programs. We discuss immigrant stratification by legal status in social policy and review how it affects citizen children in mixed-status families in three safety-net programs: the Earned Income Tax Credit, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and Child Care and Development Block Grant. We provide eight policy recommendations to restore equity to the social safety net for children in immigrant families.
自 1996 年《个人责任与工作机会协调法案》（简称“福利改革”）颁布以来，美国的社会政策越来越以合法性对移民进行分层，不仅将资格排除、福利限制和行政负担扩大到无证移民，还扩大到合法永久居民和移民家庭的美国公民身上。这种分层是结构性歧视的一种形式，是健康的社会决定因素。移民家庭的儿童，其中大多数是美国公民，无法充分从社会安全网计划中受益，包括 2020 年冠状病毒援助、救济和经济安全法案的刺激支出。关于大流行病恢复的政策审议、拜登政府的公平重点以及解决儿童贫困的提议，为重新审查公共计划中的移民排斥、限制和行政负担提供了机会。我们讨论了社会政策中按法律地位划分的移民分层现象，并审查了它如何影响混合身份家庭中公民子女在三个安全网计划中的情况：所得税抵免、补充营养援助计划和儿童保育和发展块赠款。我们提出了八项政策建议，以恢复移民家庭儿童社会安全网的公平性。
