More military families being Screwed

[Mari333]

Got this on email today:




Dear Military Families:



We have been contacted by a documentary film-maker who is trying to put together a 15-minute documentary profiling 2 or 3 American families that were left behind when Congress, at the last minute, eliminated a child tax credit for low-income families from the new tax package. The elimination of this credit means that many families, including military families, who used to get up to a $400 per child refund, now get nothing, while middle and upper middle-income families get up to a $1,000 per child tax credit/refund.



A very large number of military and veteran families are affected by the loss of this tax credit. The film-maker is looking for military families who have been affected – who have 1 to 3 children, and did not receive a refund check after the passage of the Bush Tax Cut bill earlier this year.



If you fit this description, and are willing to talk with the film-maker, please let us know and we will have him give you a call. His name is Richard Perez and he can be reached at 818-898-1331 or by e-mail at [e-mail]. A press release about this issue is included below.



In peace and solidarity

Charley Richardson and Nancy Lessin

For MFSO



This press release below was prepared by the Children's Defense Fund, an organization working with CRIE on this issue.


ONE MILLION MILITARY CHILDREN LEFT BEHIND
BY MASSIVE NEW TAX PACKAGE

Tax Cuts Abandon Military Families While Handing Millionaires Billions

WASHINGTON - One million children living in military and veteran families are being denied child tax credit help by the recently enacted massive tax cut package tilted toward the rich, according to an analysis released today by the Children's Defense Fund. More than 260,000 of these children have parents on active military duty. House and Senate leaders at the last minute dropped a provision with the approval of the Bush Administration that would have provided military families with children an additional $151 on average per child. The new tax cut law provides each of America's 190,000 millionaires $93,500 on average.

Children's Defense Fund President Marian Wright Edelman said it is profoundly unjust to ask our soldiers to defend our nation abroad while abandoning their children and families at home.

"This horrible wrong should be corrected immediately. We don't have a money problem in America, we have a values and priorities problem," said Edelman. "The urgent needs of children and hard working military and civilian families should come ahead of millionaires and billionaires."

The eliminated child tax credit provision, originally introduced in the Senate by Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), would have helped 12 million children in working families who urgently need help now when there is an economic downturn.

One in 4 American children - including nearly half of all Black and Latino children - receive nothing from the entire tax law because their hard working parents earn too little. The stock dividend tax cut, the centerpiece of the Bush Administration's plan, provides nothing to more than 9 out of 10 Latino and Black children and 7 out of 10 White children, because their families receive no stock dividends.

A fraction of the entire tax package's cost is enough to provide comprehensive health coverage for all 9.2 million uninsured American children and Head Start's comprehensive services for all 1.8 million children that need it to enter school ready to learn.

[Karenina]

1. HALLO???

:kick: