single parents

At tax time, being a parent comes with certain perks: the Child Tax Credit, the Child and Dependent Care Credit, a bigger Earned Income Tax Credit, among others. But while single parents have many of the same breaks as married parents, there are some they miss out on.

On Nov. 6, Specialist Alexis Hutchinson was arrested. Hutchinson, 21, had arrived back on her military base in Savannah, Ga., just a week earlier with her 10-month-old son, Kamani, in tow. This was not a happy trip. She'd been home in Oakland, Calif., on leave, where her mother, Angelique Hughes,...