According to the most recent data available from the nationally-representative Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), as of 2011, 38.4% of children lived in households reporting at least one form of material hardship, such as food insecurity, inability to pay essential household bills, inability to access medical care due to cost, or substandard and overcrowded housing. This is well above the rate considered to be in poverty by official estimates (17.5% as of 2017). This report examines findings from a study that measured: (1) food hardship; (2) fiscal hardship; (3) medical hardship; and (4) housing hardship. The findings in this report suggest that material hardship is a major social problem for children in the United States, especially Black and Hispanic children, one out of every two of whom lived in a household reporting some form of material hardship in 2011. Children were more likely to live in households experiencing material hardship than working age adults, and were two to four times more likely to be in households reporting material hardship than seniors. This is true for every form of hardship examined, as well as for the depth of hardship.