Explaining trends in child support: Economic, demographic, and policy effects

We use data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to examine trends in the receipt of child support (and the determinants of trends) between 1968 and 1997. The findings suggest that political, demographic, and economic forces all exerted downward pressure on child-support payments dur-ing this 30-year period, with inflation, the shift to unilateral divorce, and declines in fertility and men’s earnings being more important during the earlier years and decreases in men’s earnings be-ing more important during the later years. These negative forces were offset by the passage of new child-support legislation in the 1980s and 1990s, including numeric guidelines, universal withhold-ing, and genetic testing. hen parents live with their child, they automatically share their income with the child. When parents live apart, income sharing is not automatic, and the nonresident par-ent often fails to provide for the child. Court-ordered child support is the mechanism through which society attempts to ensure that nonresident parents make financial trans-fers to their children. The importance of child support has increased dramatically during the past four decades as more and more children have become eligible for child support. In the 1950s, most children lived with both their biological parents from birth to adult