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EITC AWARENESS DAY – ANNOUNCEMENT FROM THE IRS:

EITC AWARENESS DAY – ANNOUNCEMENT FROM THE IRS:

Join us for Awareness Day on Friday, January 27, 2023

Join us in making the 17th annual Awareness Day as successful as last year’s. We partnered with more than 1,500 supporters with a combined social reach of over 2 million. Partners sponsored over nearly 220 live events and other activities such as news releases and articles for EITC Awareness Day.

With your help, we want to make this event bigger this year to increase eligibility awareness of refundable credits that many missed claiming or don’t get right. Along with the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), we want to include the Child Tax Credit, the Additional Child Tax Credit, the Credit for Other Dependents (CTC/ACTC/ODC), and the American Opportunity Tax Credit (AOTC).

What is Awareness Day?Community organizations, elected officials, state and local governments, schools, employers, and other interested parties, partner in a national effort to increase awareness of refundable credits by shining a large spotlight on them from various media sources. We want to generate extensive media coverage on this specific day (or days in proximity) to increase awareness among potentially eligible taxpayers at the time when most of them are filing or getting ready to file their federal income tax returns. The IRS joins partners nationwide to launch the Awareness Day outreach campaign to ensure millions of workers get the credits they earned anddeserve.

This intensive media coverage helps us reach the broadest possible range of eligible taxpayers, including the underserved populations and the newly eligible taxpayers.

Why is Awareness Important? IRS estimates four of five eligible taxpayers claim and get the EITC. Best of all, EITC combined with the CTC/ACTC/ODC is a financial boost for working people and your local economy. EITC and the CTC greatly reduce poverty for working families. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities asserts that in 2018 the Child Tax Credit and EITC together lifted more children above the poverty line, 5.5 million, than any other economic support program. The American Rescue Plan Act, by making a significant set of changes to the Child Tax Credit, will lift another 4.1 million children above the poverty line, cutting the number of children in poverty by more than 40 percent. (CBPP, MAY 24, 2021, Chuck Marr, Kris Cox, Stephanie Hingtgen, and Kate Windham).

Reaching Out!

We need your help to capture the attention of those millions of workers who miss out on the benefits of refundable credits each year and motivate them to explore whether they qualify. We also want to lead them to no-cost options for tax return help--volunteer tax assistance and Free File and make sure only those eligible, claim the credit.