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The first webinar in the 2012-2013 IRP series, The Implications of Complex Families for Poverty and Child Support Policy, was presented by two national experts in the field, Maria Cancian and Daniel R. Meyer. We often think of families with children as including a mother, father, and their children in common. However, about 40 percent of children are now born to unmarried parents, and estimates suggest that more often than not, one or both of these parents will go on to have children with other partners--that is, the mother will go on to have a child with a different father and/or the father…
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Journal Article This study examines how child support arrears affect fathers' labor force participation. It relies on longitudinal data from the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being Study. Findings from analyses of these data suggest that child support arrears result in declines in average weeks worked in the formal labor market in subsequent time periods. These findings are driven by the behaviors of fathers who had relatively high amounts of arrears and no income in the previous year and are mostly robust to tests for selection into no work or low levels of work by fathers. Findings also suggest that…
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Journal Article The effect of fathers' incarceration on the well-being of children is an important concern, especially in the United States, a nation with uniquely high incarceration rates as well as a relatively weak and shrinking safety net. This study uses matched, longitudinal, administrative data from Wisconsin to estimate the effects of paternal imprisonment on child support and food stamp receipt by families with nonmarital children. The results illustrate the complex interactions among public policies. Paternal imprisonment reduces child support receipt and thereby undermines policies designed to…
In 2006, New York instituted a noncustodial parent earned income tax credit (NCP EITC) to encourage low-income noncustodial parents to work and pay child support. This study examines the credit's impacts through 2009. We use a regression discontinuity approach exploiting a drop in NCP EITC eligibility when taxpayers' youngest children turn 18, and find the NCP EITC increased the proportion of noncustodial parents paying their child support in full by approximately 1 percentage point. Effects were stronger among parents with low child support orders. Our estimates may represent upper-bound…
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Journal Article Over the past few decades, the federal government has intensified child support enforcement policies in response to high rates of child poverty and single-mother households. This study provides a comprehensive review of empirical, peer-reviewed articles from the past 20 years on the direct effects of child support enforcement policies on payments to custodial mothers and the indirect effects of these policies on behaviors such as fertility, sexual activity, welfare utilization, father involvement, and labor participation. The review indicates that child support enforcement has contributed to…
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Journal Article This paper documents a model for outreaching, connecting, and serving low-income, ethnically diverse, non-custodial fathers. Men are engaged "where they are" by building their strengths and addressing their needs. The Male Involvement Network's (MIN) collaborative model was created in Connecticut to help fathers become positive and healthy role models by increasing their attachment to their children and families (Smith, 2003). This clinically informed, case management model addresses their physical, emotional, mental, economic and spiritual health needs. Through a relational approach and…
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Nonresident fathers are an important source of social and economic support to children. This family profile focuses on economic support reported and provided by nonresident fathers using the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) 2006-2010, a nationally representative data set of men 15-44 years of age. The NSFG asks men about nonresident children under age 18 living outside the household. This profile differs from U.S. Census Bureau reports on child support which rely on mothers' reports of child support received (see Grall, 2011). The demographic characteristics of nonresident fathers (FP-…
