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Maryland CS guidelines
The November 4 Washington Post contained a story about a proposed
increase in Maryland child support guidelines. The following is an e-mail that I sent to the reporter who wrote the story. "There's a great deal of misunderstanding about child support. Your story was clear and well-written, but in any future stories you write about child support, I hope you will keep in mind the following three points: "(1) Apparently, Maryland officials are talking about "the first increase in 20 years in recommended child support payments." However, the fact is that the state's existing CS guidelines (like those of most states) are tied to the incomes of parents. See http://www.dhr.state.md.us/csea/help.php. So if parental income rises, the child support amounts rise with it. If, on top of this, the numbers in the state guidelines are raised, non-custodial parents are being told that the state doesn't care about their ability to pay, which is linked to their income levels. "(2) Because of the continued glass ceiling on paternal custody, child support is nearly always money that fathers pay mothers. This one-way flow of funds has very significant political repercussions. In most states, fathers are effectively ignored when changes in child in child support are under consideration. It would be worth talking to fathers' representatives in Maryland in the context of any future stories on this subject. (Incidentally, if Maryland is like other states, there is no requirement that all, or even any, of the child support be spent on the children.) "(3) You may want to consider asking Maryland child support officials about the proportion of cases in which child support is being paid by mothers to custodial fathers. Many like to skate over this aspect by habitually talking about 'non-custodial parents' in this context. However, it is very likely that in Maryland only a handful of fathers are receiving child support -- because (a) only a small number of fathers have custody, and (b) many fathers consider themselves lucky to get custody of their children, and do not also seek child support from their exes." |
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