The Impact of COVID-19 Economic Impact Payments on Material Hardship at Age 22: Preliminary Estimates from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study

The Impact of COVID-19 Economic Impact Payments on Material Hardship at Age 22: Preliminary Estimates from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study

The Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study (FFCWS) has been following a large and diverse sample of children born in 20 large US cities since their births in 1998 to 2000. The children—now young adults—were re-interviewed between October 2020 and January 2024, at age 22, responding to questions about their income, earnings, living arrangements, employment, education, family, financial support, health, identity, and more. These children turned 22 during the COVID-19 pandemic. As youth in the FFCWS cohort transition into young adulthood, these interviews provide an opportunity to understand how today’s young adults are faring. 

One form of widespread COVID-19 economic relief—Economic Impact Payments (EIPs, or stimulus checks)—provided flexible cash to individuals across a wide range of income levels, including those with low to no recent earnings, across three rounds of payments. Many young adults, however, were left out of the first round of relief altogether and received lower levels of later EIP payments if they were claimed as dependents for tax purposes by family.

This brief focuses on the impact of one type of economic relief delivered during the COVID-19 pandemic—Economic Impact Payments (EIPs, also known as ‘stimulus checks’)—on the material hardship of young adults, looking in particular at food hardship and difficulty with expenses. This brief is part of a series on young adults’ wellbeing at age 22.

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Key Findings

  • In this first look at the impact of EIPs on material hardship among young adults at age 22, preliminary results indicate that EIPs reduced food hardship and utility hardship—both overall and particular types of hardship in each category, albeit modestly in some areas—among young adults with low incomes. 
     
  • EIPs also reduced food and utility hardship among young adults with low incomes who are not residing with family.
     
  • No significant effects of EIPs emerged for young adults at age 22 as a whole. Nor did we find significant effects across other types of hardship, including housing hardship, financial hardship, and medical hardship.
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The study is a joint effort by Princeton University’s Bendheim-Thoman Center for Research on Child and Family Wellbeing and the Columbia Population Research Center.

The Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study is a long-running collaborative birth cohort study, which has followed a large and diverse sample of children since their births in 1998 to 2000. The children were born in 20 large cities but now reside all over the United States. When weighted, the study provides data that is nationally representative of young adults born in large cities and as such is the only nationally representative sample of a contemporary cohort of young adults followed longitudinally since birth.

Suggested Citation:

Hamilton, Christal, Megan Curran, Jane Waldfogel, Sophie Collyer, Elizabeth Ananat, Eunha Kim, Christopher Wimer, and Tia M. Dickerson. 2026. The impact of COVID-19 Economic Impact Payments on material hardship at age 22: Preliminary estimates from the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study. Princeton, NJ: The Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study. 

Published on February 27, 2026