In 2021, the US cut child poverty by as much as 40 percent using one of the most effective anti-poverty tools the country had ever devised: the expanded child tax credit (CTC). By sending unconditional monthly checks of up to $300 per child to the nation’s poorest families — including those with little to no income who had typically been excluded from such programs — the “child allowance” lifted 2.1 million children out of poverty who would’ve o…