CHILDREN’S BUDGET 2023
As the COVID-19 emergency has receded, so has our nation’s commitment to children.
Children’s Budget 2023 finds that U.S. spending on children, both here and abroad, accounts for just 9.89% of the FY 2023 federal budget, a decrease of nearly 16% in real spending from the previous fiscal year. The share of spending on children also falls well shy of the record 11.97% children’s share reached in FY 2021 at the height of the public and economic health emergency. This 2 percentage point drop from historic investments in children during FY 2021 means spending on children in FY 2023 is nearly back to the same level seen in FY 2019 prior to the pandemic.
For more than 15 years, First Focus on Children has produced our annual Children’s Budget, an analysis of the funding — and therefore the value — that we as a nation place on our children. Pushed by the emergency of the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. lawmakers finally began moving toward a fair share of federal spending for children. But as that emergency receded, so has our nation’s commitment to securing the health, safety, and well-being of our children at home and abroad.
