Better policy for Michigan’s youth starts with better data

If we want to guarantee that Michigan’s youth are thriving, then we need greater investment in their education, their health and their economic well-being.

This year’s Kids Count in Michigan Data Profiles from the Michigan League for Public Policy show that, despite some small wins, policy failures have left children in Michigan more food insecure, worse academically and with less economic assistance than before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Child food insecurity in Michigan has increased by nearly 40% since 2019, rising in 82 of 83 counties. And Michigan’s wealthiest counties saw some of the greatest relative increases, showing a concerning trend that is affecting kids and families throughout the state.

Despite more and more households struggling to afford basic needs, the majority of Michigan counties have fewer children receiving benefits from Medicaid and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC).

These trends are concerning, given that, during the same period, unemployment has increased and the median household income has remained stagnant after controlling for inflation.

Michigan’s kids also have some of the worst educational outcomes in the country — and they are not getting better. From third-grade reading to college readiness, nearly every county in Michigan is showing worse academic performance than from before the pandemic.

Fortunately, we already know the avenues we can take to tackle these challenges.

One of the positive outcomes in this year’s data profiles is the improvement in 1- and 2-year-olds who are being tested for lead in most counties. We are likely to see even greater improvements in the coming years, due to a law now in effect requiring physicians to test children for lead at 12 and 24 months.

We need similar policy change and investment across the various domains of youth well-being, particularly education and economic security.

New ‘Kids Count’ data shows drop in college readiness, education participation among young adults

For example, Michigan spending on public education instruction has struggled to return to levels at the turn of the century. However, just this summer, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed a budget that modestly increased per-pupil K-12 spending and a law that will implement professional development for K-5 teachers to improve youth reading outcomes.

At the federal level, cuts are going to continue to harm kids. Changes to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) funding have resulted in fewer children receiving benefits since the implementation of the so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill Act.” 

Future federal budget proposals also aim to slash support for programs that help children access healthy, affordable food, such as the WIC cash value benefit for fruits and vegetables.

Given the need for intervention, measuring the progress in youth well-being is critical. Ongoing data tells us if families need assistance, if children are doing well in school and if policies are working.

In particular, Kids Count in Michigan aims to provide data on children’s outcomes for every county in the state, no matter how large or small. In this effort, we rely on data from state and federal agencies as well as national nonprofit organizations — but some of these data are at risk.

Among the staggering number of altered or discontinued federal surveys is the federal food security survey, which is the country’s gold standard for estimating the prevalence of food insecurity. Our county-level child food insecurity data from Feeding America’s Map the Meal Gap rely on this survey to create accurate estimates.

There are even greater changes coming to data from the U.S. Census Bureau. 

A recent administrative order banned the use of certain data privacy practices, which is already causing delays to the much-relied-upon American Community Survey. This order might result in less data for areas with smaller populations, which could impact rural areas here in Michigan. This is on top of the federal abandonment of a directive that would have enhanced the collection of race and ethnicity data, such as by creating a new category for Middle Eastern and North African individuals.

Just this month, the Bureau published a proposed rule that would exclude noncitizens and remove questions about race and ethnicity from the decennial Census. These two provisions could overhaul our ability to understand who lives where, to allocate appropriate funding and to equitably distribute political power — the exclusion of noncitizens from the Census is also widely considered to be unconstitutional.

These sweeping changes may hinder our ability to understand how young people, of all backgrounds and in all corners of the state, are doing.

In the meantime, the League will continue to advocate for policies that invest in the well-being of children and young adults here in Michigan. The data we have now shows that they need it.

You can explore all of the Kids Count in Michigan Data Profiles by visiting https://mlpp.org/2026-kids-count-in-michigan-data-profiles/.