Purpose <p>Child maltreatment is a serious problem in the United States. Geographical disparities in child maltreatment rates suggest that neighborhood characteristics may affect child maltreatment behaviors. The objective of the current systematic review is to understand how neighborhood economic characteristics affect caregivers’ child maltreatment behaviors so that these characteristics can be addressed to prevent child maltreatment. The current systematic review will address the following research question: What type of neighborhood economic characteristics are positively associated with caregivers’ child maltreatment?</p> Methods <p>Using relevant databases (SocIndex, PsycInfo, PubMed, and ERIC), articles related to child maltreatment were collected. Inclusion criteria include studies that were peer-reviewed, written in English, conducted in a US setting, utilized quantitative methods, had child maltreatment as the dependent variable, and included neighborhood economic characteristics as an independent variable. Following the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, 13 articles were selected.</p> Results <p>Most studies concluded neighborhood economic characteristics were associated with child maltreatment. Specifically, neighborhood poverty, unemployment rate, proportion of female-headed households, public assistance receipt, proportion of low-income housing tax credit were significantly positively associated with child maltreatment.</p> Conclusions <p>These findings suggest that reducing neighborhood poverty and alleviating concentrated economic disadvantage may be potential strategies to reduce child maltreatment. However, the causal interpretation of some of these findings, in the context of nonrandomly assigned neighborhood characteristics, are limited further by their use of cross-sectional designs and rare use of quasi-experimental methods; and generalizability is limited due to utilizing non-national data. Additional nationally representative longitudinal studies and studies using strong quasi-experimental approaches are warranted to understand the causal relationship between neighborhood economic characteristics and child maltreatment.</p>