Report: Positive and Troubling Trends of Child Well-Being in Illinois

(Undated) -- An annual snapshot of child well-being finds both good and bad news in Illinois. According to the national Kids Count Data Book, over the past decade, there have been improvements in the teen birth rate, mortality rate for children and teens, and the number of kids with health insurance. And while there are troubling trends in child poverty and family economic security indicators, Larry Joseph with Voices for Illinois Children says efforts to reduce poverty through the state's Earned Income Tax Credit are featured in the report. The E-I-T-C now benefits more than one million children in Illinois, and Joseph says they are now working to expand it to 20 percent of the federal credit over a five-year period. He notes that on most indicators in the report, Illinois is close to or somewhat better than the U-S average.