A New Approach to Child Support

This series of three papers is stimulated in part by a September 2000 Abell Foundation publication, Improving Child Well-Being, by Wendell Primus and Kristina Daugirdas. The papers highlight some shortfalls in the current child support system as it serves lower-income children and parents.

Among the highlights from the three papers:

Maryland requires low-income parents to pay more of their income in child support than almost every other state. Several problems result:

The child support guidelines can take up such a large percentage of a low-income parent's earnings that they cannot both pay child support and meet their own subsistence needs.

The high guidelines contribute to an epidemic of cases with child support arrearages.

Even with the high guidelines, the payments required from low-income parents are not large enough to cover the costs of raising a child.

These Maryland Policy Reports suggest some solutions:

Lower the child support guidelines for lower-income parents

Change the "minimum income threshold"-- the amount of earnings that a parent with a child support order must have before the full guidelines apply. The suggested changes are to increase the threshold, and consider only the income of the parent paying the child support.

Other strategies may increase compliance with child support orders:

Make it easier to modify support orders for both parents. This would help prevent the accumulation of arrearages by having child support orders that reflect current income levels for both parents.

Use various incentives to increase compliance. This would include "passing-through and disregarding" child support paid for children in families that receive cash assistance (under current state law, none of the child support that is collected for children in families that receive cash assistance is passed on to the family. The state keeps it all and shares a portion with the federal government). Other incentives could include increasing access to support services, such as Medicaid and housing assistance, for parents who pay child support, and matching a portion of the support paid by lower-income parents.

The third paper in the series focuses on boosting the incomes of parents with child support obligations as one way to improve child well-being. In general, research has shown that the factor most closely related to compliance with a child support order is the ability to pay. That is, parents are much more likely to pay child support if they can afford it. Unfortunately, many parents with child support obligations have very low incomes.

In a 1999 survey of new, unwed fathers in Baltimore, more than one in three reported earning less than $10,000 in the previous year; and, two out of three reported earning less than $20,000. Further, the earnings prospects of many of these fathers are limited: one in three had not completed high school; less than one out of five had any education beyond high school. Therefore, one strategy to increasing child support collections is to increase the ability to pay by focusing on improving the job skills of parents.

This third paper can be downloaded by clicking the link below.

At this time, the Maryland House of Delegates has passed legislation that would lower the child support guidelines for low-income parents. The bill will be considered in the Senate.

Related Reports:

Maryland Policy Report V2#2, Using Financial Incentives to Encourage and Reward the Payment of Child Support.

Maryland Policy Report V2#3, Getting Low-Income Parents to Pay Child Support: The Problem, the Reasons, and One Part of the Solution.