Californla Department of Child Support Services Strategic Plan, 2006-2009

Since the California Department of Child Support Services began operations in 2000, the child support program has evolved from a decentralized system administered by local district attorneys to a statewide program operated by 52 local child support agencies overseen by the state. These changes have strengthened and enhanced our ability to deliver uniform, high quality services to families across California. Continuous improvement in program performance, implementation of federal automation requirements, and enhanced customer service are at the core of our operation. To guide this effort, I am pleased to share with you the California Child Support Services Program 2006-2009 Strategic Plan

Navigating the Child Support System: Lessons from the Fathers at Work Initiative

Research shows that nearly half of all children born in the US today will be eligible for child support before they reach the age of 18. Many low-income, noncustodial fathers -- who often struggle to make these payments -- will seek services from workforce development organizations. Yet, understanding the child support enforcement system can be challenging -- not only for noncustodial fathers but also for the workforce organizations that want to assist them.Navigating the Child Support System aims to help meet this challenge by providing information, resources and tools to use at the intersection of workforce development and child support enforcement. The guide is based on lessons from the Fathers at Work initiative, a three-year, six-site demonstration funded by the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, which was designed to help young, noncustodial fathers achieve increased employment and earnings, involvement in their children's lives, and more consistent financial support of their children.The guide describes child support enforcement regulations, policies and actions that can affect fathers' willingness to seek formal employment and participate in the system, and provides examples of four services that organizations might offer to benefit fathers and their families. Navigating the Child Support System offers concrete suggestions for incorporating child support services into workforce organizations' assistance to low-income, male participants, including developing partnerships with local child support enforcement agencies. It includes seven tools for learning about child support and setting goals for enhancing services to noncustodial fathers

Understanding Child Support Trends: Economic, Demographic, and Political Contributions

We use data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) to examine trends in child support payments over the past thirty years and to assess five different explanations for these trends: inflation, the shift to unilateral divorce, changes in marital status composition, changes in men's and women's earnings, and ineffective child support laws. We find that during the 1970s and early 1980s, three factors high inflation, increase in non-marital childbearing, and shifts to unilateral divorse--exerted downward pressure on child support payments. Throughout this time period, child support policies were weak, and average real payments declined sharply. Our findings indicate that two child support policies legislative guidelines for awards and universal wage withholding--are important for insuring child support payments. Finally, our analyses suggest that further gains in child support payments will rest with our ability to collect child support for children born to unwed parents. These children are the fastest growing group of children in the US, and they are the least likely to receive child support. To date, child support policies have been ineffective in assuring child support for never married mothers.

Health insurance and child support

The child support system has been increasing its efforts to make health insurance a part of child support awards. Data from the 1990 Current Population Survey Child Support Supplement show that 40 percent of child support awards require that the noncustodial parent provide health insurance to his children. However, in a third of the cases, the noncustodial parents are not providing coverage. This matters because 16 percent of the children whose noncustodial fathers are not providing the coverage they were ordered to provide are not insured through other sources (e.g., Medicaid). But expecting noncustodial parents to be the sole providers of health insurance for their children may be unwise. Data from Wisconsin suggest that fewer than half (and probably less than 10 percent) of uninsured children in custodial- parent families have a noncustodial parent who can afford to provide health insurance for them. Health care reform is needed so that all children will have coverage, whether it is provided by their parents or the government.

Child support liability and partnership dissolution

This paper studies the determinants of partnership dissolution and focuses on the role of child support. We exploit the variation in child support liabilities driven by an important UK policy reform to separately identify the effects of children from the effect of child support liability. We find strong evidence that an increase in the child support liability significantly reduces dissolution risk. Our results suggest that child support criteria that are based on the non-custodial parent's income, compared to criteria based on aggregate incomes of both parents, would imply much smaller separation rates.

Another factor to consider in choosing a child support guideline: Errors in child support calculations

In an effort to standardize the calculation of monthly child support awards, the federal government requires states to use preestablished formulas to determine the amount of awards. However, because of human error, differences in the experience and training of the officials making the calculations, and the extent to which computers are used to calculate the awards, the formulas do not always yield the same result. In fact, the discrepancy between the amount calculated by an individual child support official and the approved amount as calculated by the state in which that official works can be quite large, on the order of several hundred dollars. Adopting simpler formulas will reduce errors; this should be a priority even if child support officials use computers to calculate award amounts (computers can reduce errors but will not eliminate them, particularly in the case of complex formulas). Efforts to further the training and education of personnel who calculate awards would also help, and child support offices should revise their formulas to cover high-income cases.

Child Support and Partnership Dissolution: Evidence from the UK

This paper studies the determinants of partnership dissolution and focuses on the role of child support. We exploit the variation in child support liabilities driven by an important UK policy reform to separately identify the effects of children from the effect of child support liability. We find strong evidence that an increase in the child support liability significantly reduces dissolution risk. Our results suggest that child support criteria that are based on the non-custodial parent’s income, compared to criteria based on aggregate incomes of both parents, would imply much smaller separation rates

Child Support Enforcement and Children's Consumption

This paper examines the consequences of child support enforcement on custodial mothers' consumption decisions. We model the interaction in separated couples as a repeated game between the noncustodial father and the custodial mother who share a common good: the child. The mother exclusively controls the child's consumption, whereas the father can only influence the child's consumption indirectly through transfers to the mother. Initially, it is a double sided lack of commitment problem, where parents voluntarily agree on transfer payments and child expenditure, but can renege on their part of the contract at any time. Using the non-cooperative Nash-Stackelberg equilibrium as a threat point, we look for the Pareto frontier of Subgame Perfect Equilibrium payoffs and characterize the equilibrium of the model. We then incorporate the legal background by allowing for strict child support enforcement. The enforcement equilibrium serves as the new threat point which supports the new Pareto frontier of payoffs. Relative to the old, no-enforcement threat point, enforcement delivers a higher utility to the mother, making it harder to satisfy her incentive for spending large amounts on the child. As a result, mothers will spend a larger fraction of their income on themselves and a lower fraction on the child. We test that hypothesis using CEX data from years before and after the enforcement policies were implemented. The results indicate a significant increase in this ratio for mothers receiving child support, supporting the model prediction. On the other hand, there is no observable change in that ratio for mothers not receiving child support suggesting that their behavior was, as expected, unaffected by the new laws.