Are child support laws in the United States justified?

Answer 1

That depends on your perspective. The goal of American child support laws is to ensure that parents fulfill their obligation to provide for their children financially. Whether or not our system meets that goal is a matter of intense debate.

Critics say that the laws aren’t fair for non-custodial parents, or that the laws don’t make enough distinctions to allow for unusual circumstances. To dig into those issues, let’s look at a few child support statistics, courtesy of the CDC:

• About half of all 13.6 million custodial parents have child support agreements. Some of these agreements are informal, which means they're not legally enforced.
• About two-thirds of custodial parents receive some payments from non-custodial parents.
• However, only 43.5 percent of custodial parents receive the full amount of child support owed to them. That means a large percentage of noncustodial parents make partial payments.
• In 2015, the total amount of child support due was $33.7 billion.

Given those numbers, it might be reasonable to question whether child support laws are justified, since a hefty percentage of noncustodial parents aren't paying their due (or they're paying less than the full amount of their obligation). There are two simple conclusions: Either child support payments are set at unreasonably high levels, or noncustodial parents don't face serious legal repercussions for failing to pay.

In either case, there's something wrong with the system we use to mandate child support payments. However, there are other factors to consider.

States set child support laws, not the federal government.

Here's an issue with the phrasing of the question: For the most part, states set and enforce child support laws, and those laws vary greatly from state to state.

That's not to say that there aren’t any nationwide regulations concerning child support. For example, federal law makes it illegal for parents to willfully fail to pay child support after receiving a court order, even if that parent is not living in the state where the order was charged. This gives courts the right to enforce child support laws across state lines.

Also, per 18 U.S.C. § 228(a)(2), people who owe child support cannot cross state lines or flee the country to avoid paying their past-due child support. If they do so, they face fines and prison time.

Apart from those laws, however, states are responsible for setting up their child support systems. All child support enforcement matters "must be addressed at the local or state level before concerns can be raised at the federal level," per the Department of Justice.

States generally set their child support models to one of these standards:

The Income Shares Model - This is the most common model, used by 40 states. The basic idea is that the child should receive the same proportion of the parental income that they received when the parents were together. It considers both parents' income. Therefore, if a custodial parent makes significantly more than the non-custodial parent, the non-custodial parent will pay less (and vice-versa).

The Percentage of Income Model - In this model, the support calculation looks at the noncustodial parent’s income, but not the custodial parent’s income. Seven states use this model.

The Melson Formula - The most complicated of the models, the Melson Formula incorporates several public policy judgments in order to adequately provide for the basic needs of each parent (in addition to the children's needs). Basically, it allows more money for child support as income changes. Three states (Delaware, Hawaii, and Montana) use the Melson Formula.

A paper written by Jennifer Noyes of the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison noted that “"he Income Shares model is perceived to be fairer than the Percentage of Income model because it explicitly, rather than implicitly, accounts for the contributions of both parents in the calculation of child support."

However, Noyes also pointed out that shared-custody arrangements are becoming more common, and some states have revised their child support calculations to accommodate for these situations. It’s extremely difficult to calculate a perfectly "fair" payment in every case, and each of the models has issues. That’s part of the reason for the high number of non-payments in the U.S. child support system—states have a tough time figuring out fair systems that adequately protect children.

So, are American child support laws justified? Yes and no. Ultimately, child support laws make sense; it takes two parents to create a child, and both parents have an obligation to provide for their children, regardless of whether or not they have custody. However, our system could probably use some improvement, and any changes will have to occur at the state level.