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Legislating Adequacy: The Impact of Child Support Guidelines

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2024

Jessica Pearson ,
Nancy Thoennes  and
Patricia Tjaden
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Abstract

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Three major child support guideline models are currently used in the United States to stimulate adequate levels of child support. To evaluate the effects of these guidelines, we examined cases filed before and after their introduction in three states that enacted different models. Overall, we found a modest increase in child support awards and few differences across models. The most substantial increases occurred in low-income cases in settings in which awards had historically been low. Guidelines also appeared to decrease the likelihood of a zero dollar award in cases that had previously lacked orders: those in which the father was unemployed and in which the obligor was female.

Post-guideline order levels in low-income families still fall short of the best available estimates of expenditures on children in intact households; they match expenditures in intact households in middle-and upper-income families. We consider several factors that may explain the limitations as well as the successes of guidelines in stimulating change.

Type
Research Article
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 23 , Issue 4 , 1989 , pp. 569 - 590
Copyright
Copyright © 1989 The Law and Society Association

Footnotes

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the annual meeting of the Law and Society Association, Madison, Wisconsin, June 8–11, 1989. The research was supported by a grant from the State Justice Institute in Alexandria, Virginia. However, the views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the policies of the institute.

References

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