November 20, 2014, 2014 by Robert Franklin, Esq, Member, National Board of Directors, National Parents Organization
Vicki Turetsky is the Commissioner of the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement and, within the understandable parameters of that job, a very good one. As with any bureaucrat, she’s limited in what she can accomplish, but Turetsky has always demonstrated a balanced understanding of the child support system. She’s no “higher support orders mean more support” type of fanatic. “Lock ‘em up and throw away the key” has never been her approach to non-custodial parents who can’t pay.
Indeed, it’s been Turetsky who, over the past few years has gone on record pleading with states to be reasonable in setting child support guidelines. Her reports have been the ones pointing out that over 60% of non-custodial parents who are behind on their orders earn under $10,000 per year.
But that’s been only hortatory. Beyond her personal desire to make the child support system make some sense, those statements meant nothing.
But with the publication in the federal register of proposed new rules on child support, all that changes. The proposed rules state the intention of the OCSE to require states to do a number of things that would bring child support orders a long way toward responsibility and common sense. They’d also mean non-custodial parents would be more likely to pay what they owe, less likely to fall behind and less likely still to be incarcerated for failure to pay.
Click here to go to the publication in the Federal Register. From there, go to pages 68553 – 68557 for the pertinent proposed rules. You’ll find them under the heading “Section 302.56: Guidelines for Setting Child Support Awards.”
The OCSE’s publication in the Federal Register begins by reciting some of the applicable research on child support.
A growing body of research finds that compliance with child support orders in some States, regardless of income level, declines when the support obligation is set above 15–20 percent of the obligor’s income, and that orders for excessive amounts result in lower, not higher, child support payments.14 States like California and Washington have found that the direct result of establishing support obligations that exceed the ability of obligors to meet them is unpaid arrearages. Most arrearages are owed by noncustodial parents with earnings under $10,000 and are uncollectible.15 Research finds that high arrearages substantially reduce the formal earnings of noncustodial parents and child support payments in economically disadvantaged families, while reducing unmanageable arrearages can increase payments.16 Accumulation of high arrearage balances is often associated with incarceration, because parents have little to no ability to earn income while they are incarcerated, and little ability to pay off the arrearages when released due to lack of employment.17
Stated another way, when parents have a manageable child support order, they tend to pay it; when the level is set too high, they know they can’t pay it, become discouraged and pay little or nothing of what they owe. That’s particularly true of low-income parents. The only thing states get out of setting support levels too high is massive arrearages, and, I would add, a massive state bureaucracy whose job it is to collect money all know to be “uncollectible.” The optimum level of support appears to be around 15% of the non-custodial parent’s income. Anything above that tends to result in lower payments, not higher.
So one of the proposed new rules would require states to set orders at levels parents can actually pay. It’s amazing that, at this late date, we should have to be fighting that particular fight. In a saner world, it’d be a given that orders would be set that way, but the child support world has never been called sensible.
Another part of that concept is that modifications should occur in ways that would reflect the non-custodial parent’s ability to pay. Likewise, orders should be based on actual evidence of parent’s earnings. That means judges would be required, in all but the rarest of cases, to hold hearings, gather information on the ability to pay and issue orders based thereon. In other words, default judgments should be a rarity and, most importantly, so should imputation of income.
Setting child support orders that reflect an actual ability to pay is crucial to encouraging compliance, increasing accountability for making regular payments, and discouraging uncollectible arrearages. On January 30, 2013, the National Child Support Enforcement Association issued a policy statement indicating that: ‘‘As a general rule, child support guidelines and orders should reflect actual income of parents and be changed proactively to ensure current support orders reflect current circumstances of the parents and to encourage regular child support payments. Presumed or default orders should occur only in limited circumstances.’’ 21
Then there’s the little matter that many states consider a parent’s incarceration to be “voluntary unemployment.” Really. For purposes of deciding child support, those states assume that a father who’s in jail went there intentionally to avoid paying child support. They therefore refuse to abate his payments with the result that he gets out of prison burdened with tens of thousands of dollars in unpaid child support debt, plus interests and fees. That’s a debt that will never be paid, but will make his life on the outside essentially impossible.
That’s the background. The actual proposed new rules begin on page 68555.
First, only the “actual earnings” of a non-custodial parent will be able to be used in calculating child support.
Second, states will be required to include in their child support guidelines, a basic subsistence level of income the non-custodial parent will be able to maintain. Income considered for child support calculations will only be that that exceeds that subsistence level. Some states already incorporate such a subsistence income into their guidelines, but many do not. The new rules would require all states to do so.
Third, while discouraging the imputation of income, the new rules allow it in cases in which “the noncustodial parent’s lifestyle is inconsistent with earnings or income and where there is evidence of income or assets beyond those identified.”
Fourth, the proposed rules would prohibit states from considering incarceration to be “voluntary unemployment.”
Fifth (p. 68557), if a parent is hauled into court in contempt proceedings for failure to pay, the new rules would require states to allow the parent a subsistence living before he can be held in contempt.
In addition, we encourage States to develop procedures to take into account the noncustodial parent’s subsistence level in other child support enforcement procedures such as credit bureau reporting, license revocation, State tax refund offset, and liens.
Sixth, the OCSE rules would require judges to make written findings of fact based on actual evidence produced in court that a parent held in contempt is actually able to pay but refuses. That’s an attempt to make states comply with the requirements of Turner vs. Rogers decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2011.
Seventh, the rules would require states, as part of their child support enforcement systems, to provide low-income parents job services to help them train for, obtain and keep employment.
Those are far from the only proposals made by the OCSE to change its rules on state child support systems, but they’re the ones that most directly impact non-custodial parents. For the most part, they’d make significant improvements in those systems.
What’s important at this point is that they’re proposed rules, not rules. That means the OCSE is now soliciting public comment on them, which further means that advocates for family court reform MUST make their voices known. Here’s the link for commenting. (In the search engine, type in the name of the document, “Flexibility, Efficiency and Modernization in Child Support Enforcement Programs.” That’ll take you to the comment page. Comments are due by January 15, 2015.)
By all means, let the OCSE know what you think and do so in an intelligent, civil way. Those who wish to keep child support levels as high as possible will be commenting and we must as well.
National Parents Organization is a Shared Parenting Organization
National Parents Organization is a non-profit that educates the public, families, educators, and legislators about the importance of shared parenting and how it can reduce conflict in children, parents, and extended families. Along with Shared Parenting we advocate for fair Child Support and Alimony Legislation. Want to get involved? Here’s how:
- Become an official member of the National Parents Organization team.
- Join our Facebook Page.
Together, we can drive home the family, child development, social and national benefits of shared parenting, and fair child support and alimony. Thank you for your activism.
#childsupport, #OfficeofChildSupportEnforcement, #VickiTuretsky, #proposedrules, #non-custodialparents
25 replies on “Office of Child Support Enforcement Proposes Constructive New Rules for States”
It astonishes me how far out-of-touch this is. That NPO believes any of this is reasonable and cause for hope is laughable. And precisely why nothing ever gets done. Anything less than working for the abolition of so-called “child” support is a waste of everyone’s time.
@ j – Child support is unnecessary in almost all instances. It’s sole purpose is to persecute fathers and children in exchange for votes and money. Child support can never be administered responsibly. Almost all fathers support their children the best they can. The only time they can’t is when mothers and governments interfere. An infinitesimally small number of fathers refuse deliberately to support children but that is because they have been alienated. Using children as an excuse to persecute fathers is child abuse. States will not reduce orders for child support as long as the federal government pays them for every dollar ordered. Until my circumstances improve dramatically then no meaningful changes have been made. No solution is adequate short of eliminating the orders against me, eliminating my arrears, returning money which has already been taken plus interest and returning my passport. Forcing me to work without compensation and under threat of imprisonment is slavery.
Mothers choose to have children. Fathers have no choices. If the mothers choose further and refuse to cooperate with fathers in raising their children, then the mothers should be forced under threat of imprisonment to support the children themselves in compliance with the same expectations imposed presently upon fathers. Too many mothers live like pigs at troughs while fathers live in abject poverty and are denied access to their children. Men who work without compensation and under threat of imprisonment if they cannot work can’t maintain civilization. And women won’t and can’t maintain it. Civilization is the product exclusively of men. And women are the primary beneficiaries already. Using children as excuses to enslave men so that women can benefit even more at the expense of the lives and livelihoods of men is psychopathic. There are no rights without responsibilities. Using children as hostages for ransom to avoid responsibility is destructive.
“A growing body of research finds that compliance with child support orders in some States, regardless of income level, declines when the support obligation is set above 15–20 percent…”
This conclusion is misleading and a red herring. Typical feminist ploy. As long as a father with an average income is forced to pay fifteen to twenty percent of his gross income, then the mother doesn’t have any financial obligations. It’s all on him. Where’s the equity in that? More likely, the mother has a surplus of child support for her own excessive life-style choices. And the man still lives in poverty. How is this conclusion even helpful to a solution? It’s simply nonsensical and wrong. Still waiting for answers. Despite Vicki’s high rank in administration, she still has no understanding about basic math, equality and the problem with which all fathers are presented by our abusive system of child support. She needs to be replaced by someone educated and competent.
As a tenured, highly educated and greatly accomplished research scientist who has made significant contributions to many challenging projects and solved many great problems in the Natural Sciences and who has studied the problem of government interference in families and the child support problem longer than Vicki Turetsky has been making these problems, I conclude decisively that “A growing body of research (does NOT) find(s) that compliance with child support orders in some States, regardless of income level, declines when the support obligation is set above 15–20 percent…” This statement is feminist agitprop and a complete lie. I’m a much better scientist, researcher and mathematician than anyone on whom Vicki relies to generate such nonsensical claims for profit and political expedience and I call bullshit. What a bunch of crap. Anybody who believes such nonsense should be ashamed of themselves. Such a claim only promotes the status quo. Vicki isn’t fooling me.
“A growing body of research finds that compliance in some States declines when the obligation is above 15–20 percent…”
This conclusion is broadcast by Vicki’s office to promote the status quo. It misses the whole problem and doesn’t contribute to a solution. A father who pays the mother for an average number of children fifteen to twenty percent of an average annual income lives below the threshold for poverty, rations all necessities for survival and will never retire. But the mother can live like a pig at a trough and doesn’t even have to retire because she’s already essentially retired. It’s not rocket science and doesn’t require “research”. It’s basic math. Understanding of which feminists like Vicki are woefully ignorant. If there is a way for me to pay 15-20% of my average income and still live above poverty and retire, then her office has an obligation to prepare for me a budget which accommodates that. I’m a mathematical genius and I haven’t figured it out yet.
I do not believe that she is sincere in her efforts but perpetuates the problem for profit. She is a (feminist) administrator in a government bureaucracy. When there isn’t a problem to solve, bureaucracies create them by manufacturing irresponsible female victims and stealing from responsible men to pay for them. Prior to the invention of “child support” almost all children grew up in families with both parents. Since then, more than 50% grow up in single-mother households without the father. A large percent of single-mother households are poor not because they don’t have means but because they refuse deliberately to manage them. Single-mother households represent most abused children. And so on. Child support caused these problems. More child support won’t solve them. It will only create more. If feminists like Vicki Turetsky deny their responsibility for a problem and its consequences and can’t relate cause and effect then how can they be expected to solve the problem.
Vicki’s proposals are unhelpful to almost all fathers who owe child support or their children. They just perpetuate the status quo. Another epic fail for Vicki and the Federal Office for Child Support Enforcement. That she and her office are simply trying to avoid a real solution to the real problem is obvious.
“…if a parent is in court for contempt, rules require a subsistence living before conviction…” If a father can’t subsist then the order is too great already. And states presently consider living on the street and eating out of garbage cans subsistence.
“…rules require states to provide low-income parents job services…” Hillary Clinton proposed this ages ago. It amounted to prison-work-release then and still does. I have a PhD, a MS, a BS and have been in my field for 30 yrs but take home only $16,000/yr. A program like that won’t help me or any other man.
“…rules would prohibit considering incarceration to be ‘voluntary unemployment.'” Then they’ll consider it ‘involuntary’ and persecute the father anyway.
“…the rules allow imputed income when “noncustodial parent’s lifestyle is inconsistent with earnings.” This rule just allows states to impoverish fathers. What about life-style and earnings of the mother?
These rules just allow mothers in conspiracy with governments to enslave men (especially ones who work the hardest, have the most educations and have made the most contributions) and force them to work long past a reasonable retirement date while living on the street and eating out of garbage cans. These rules are not helpful but are actively destructive and promote the unmitigated persecution, enslavement, impoverishment, imprisonment and extermination of responsible, hard-working and honest men. The rules discourage men from educating themselves, parenting, working and taking care of themselves because they actively punish these responsible behaviors and choices. Can the proposed solutions to a problem be any more backward and counter-productive? Leave it to a bunch of psychopaths to solve a problem by making it worse. Only a psychopath can think to put out a fire by pouring gasoline on it. Genius!!!
Bravo Doc!
To highlight a few things:
– Slavery – yes!
– Child support can NEVER be administered responsibly. You are so right about this and something I’ve been saying for years. There is no such thing as a “fair” child support system. The idea that you can involve some enormous and costly bureaucracy to make “fair” decisions is pure fantasy. This is ivory tower thinking if I ever saw it. My Bro’s ex just dragged him through court again. He has to pay over $30k in his and hers attorney fees. He doesn’t have the money. Every time I see someone write about involving lawyers, judges, hearings, etc. I shake my head in disgust.
– These proposals just perpetuate the problem. Again you’re right. I said the same thing about MA alimony reform. The little (and I mean very little) that was done only solidified alimony as a legitimate process. The only way to “reform” alimony is to abolish it, just like child support.
Vicki’s Federal Office of Child Support Enforcement can’t compel states to do anything but she CAN do some things herself and chooses not to. Here’s a few suggestions:
(1) Increase the threshold arrears with which passports are suspended – presently it’s $2,500 which is ridiculous
(2) Return passports to fathers regardless of arrears because all passport suspension does is prevent responsible men from escaping their persecutors so the government and women can enslave them
(3) Remove from Title IV-D most of the other nonsensical mechanisms for coercing payment like prison and seizure of retirement and other financial accounts
(4) VAWA is a primary mechanism with which women get child support in the first place but this law is sexist, is abused in almost all instances, is used conveniently by dishonest women to game the system, and only hurts the real victims of domestic violence (both men and women) by denying them access to help
Child support is a primary mechanism with which feminists persecute, impoverish, enslave, imprison and exterminate responsible, hard-working and honest men. It also is the primary mechanism with which feminists deny children relationships with their fathers. It is unnecessary in almost all instances. Almost all fathers support their children the best they can. The only time they can’t is when mothers and governments interfere. A tiny number of fathers refuse deliberately to support their children but only because they have been alienated. Using children as excuses to persecute men is an egregious form of child abuse which has been institutionalized and systematized in the US. More than forty-million fathers have been separated forcibly from more than twenty-five million fathers during the past fifty years in the US. Child support is one of the most important tools (of many) by which feminists accomplish this crime. Governments acquiesce in exchange for money and power.
“..Turetsky over the past few years has plead with states to be reasonable in setting child support guidelines…”
Pleading with one hand and giving states outrageous incentives with the other is unhelpful. Like any feminist, Vicki does not understand or is in denial of the problem and her contribution to it. There are many things her office must do first before pleading with states (and then maybe she doesn’t have to plead). But she doesn’t do these things. Until she starts proposing real solutions to real problems (instead of the nonsense presented in this article) then the problems are only going to get worse. It seems from this article that her only solution to the problem is more micromanagement of the lives and deaths of fathers. But that’s the problem already. Doing more is only going to make the problem worse. The only solution to the problem is eliminating the solutions already implemented and to stop implementing more. Typical psychopath.
“It seems from this article that her only solution to the problem is more micromanagement of the lives and deaths of fathers.”
Is anyone from NPO reading this?
“… all passport suspension does is prevent responsible men from escaping their persecutors so the government and women can enslave them.”
Correct. In 2014, in the United States of America, runaway slave prevention is official policy.
What utterly confounds me is why NPO officially supports “fair” child support and alimony AND intact families. You very obviously can’t have both post-separation transfer payments (i.e. stealing) AND intact families. It’s the private welfare mechanism that’s CREATING family break-up.
When will NPO get serious about all this? When will NPO take a stand against the greatest human rights violations of the “free” world and call for an END (not reform) to this system?
“When will NPO get serious about all this?”
In deed. I’ve been reading NPO for years and have learned a lot from Robert Franklin and Ned Holstein about family law. Unfortunately, law is not a solution to our dilemma. Plato 2,500 years ago wrote: “Responsible people don’t need laws to be responsible and irresponsible people will always find ways to violate laws.” The problem with family law is that it exists. There is no way to administer it responsibly. Especially as long as women represent a growing majority of the population and electorate and keep voting themselves rights without responsibilities at the expense of the lives and livelihoods of men. More laws are not a solution. Only elimination of all existing laws. As long as women are allowed to vote, they will manipulate the public with the spectacle of their chronic victimhood and governments will acquiesce by persecuting men and children. Vicki has offered no meaningful solutions but more problems.
There have always been and always will be bad governments and laws. National Parents Organization changed its name from Fathers and Families. The latter described the problem much more accurately. Men and fathers are victims of women and feminists. The name “NPO” misrepresents the problem as governments and laws. People in the MRM have to stop reframing the problem by blaming the irresponsible choices and behavior of women as a fault of governments and laws. Or stress, hormones, circumstances, income and/or especially men. The problem is the irresponsible choices and behavior of women and feminists. Period. Almost all victims of family law are men. NOT women. And even when a rare woman is the victim of family law, consequences for her aren’t nearly as bad as they are for a man. By inviting women in to solve the problem by portraying themselves as victims when they are not only perpetuates the problem and all the solutions will be for women at the further expense of men.
.Darryl, family law is NOT populated by psychopaths. That kind of generalization is not helpful. It IS populated by anti-male feminists of all types, as well as greedy, self-serving people of all types. Read Dr. Stephen Baskerville’s book, “TAKEN INTO CUSTODY” for an in-depth commentary on family law profiteering.
The overwhelming consensus at the Divorce Corp. Family Law Conference, 11/14/2014, was that money and the loss of family resources in divorce conflict is the overarching primary threat to parents, children, and society. How do we most effectively take money off the table and out of the equation?
Is taking money off the table our primary objective? If not, what is it? If so, are priorities and resources aligned with this objective?
For example: Is it easier to explain, propose, and gain majority support for joint custody and equal parenting time, or demonstrate and propose a uniform child support system that eliminates the financial incentive to seek primary custody and possession of the children in the first place?
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“If shared custody is NOT awarded, judge will provide facts to defend a decision. If custody is NOT supported by a parent, the parent amenable to sharing will be awarded full custody and the non-cooperative parent will have no less than 2 nites/wk…”
The system of family law is populated by psychopaths. Psychopaths have no analytical skills or logic. False allegations of DV, rape or child abuse are all the facts a judge needs to award a mother custody. Since false allegations require no proof, judges do not hold mothers responsible or accountable for them (VAWA) and judges are rewarded for indulging them, then a mother can make as many as she wants. Until laws like VAWA which allow mothers to make false allegations with impunity and for profit are eliminated and mothers are punished, then presumption of shared parenting is not possible. Attorneys, judges and the rest of the DV industry continue to profit as fathers spend all their money defending them selves.
Psychopaths (a) lack empathy, remorse, shame, guilt, and agency (b) demonstrate no analytical skills or logic, (c) are glib, insincere, disingenuous and present with shallow affect, (d) are solipsistic, parasitic, opportunistic, manipulative, deceitful and duplicitous, (e) are irresponsible and blame others for the consequences of their own misbehavior, (f) lie compulsively and pathologically, (g) are short-sighted and unable to plan ahead, (h) have an inflated sense of entitlement, (i) are hypocrites and believe the rules apply to everyone except them, (j) contribute nothing to solving problems except telling others what to do and make themselves look good by making others look bad, (k) are uncivilized animals devoid of conscience and depend upon constant affirmation by others of their existence, (l) are authoritarian and demonstrate no independent thought, and (m) use childish defense mechanisms like projection, compartmentalization and rationalization
I have edited my comment in response to the down-vote. The office of Vicki Turetsky has had considerable time for both preempting and responding to the problems caused by our (extremely) abusive child support enforcement system. That I and other men like myself have not found relief yet is evidence of that. I am well aware of the obstacles to progress presented by a bureaucracy. That being written, development of the proposed new rules which make matters worse instead of better are not encumbered by any of them.
Child support shouldn’t even exist honestly. It is unfair for the father to have to pay the mother every month when they are just as much a suitable parent and kids are naturally granted to the mother. There needs to be more considerations than just lower payments. Like fathers should never have to pay the mother during their summer time now what sense does that make. Honestly believe child support should not be cash it should be supplies and clothes only.
No one ever looks at the situation why are the parents splitting up in the first place. Sorry I have had four kids and don’t receive child support on any of them and I don’t want it either. One the dad didn’t want to be involved that’s fine why would I go through all the fuss and hassle to force him to pay and visit sorry I believe that’s just more drama that my child doesn’t need the other father he is very helpful if I am truly in need to where I would ask he is there if he can be, because it’s my choice to keep the kids I know he would keep them so why would I force him to pay me anything when it’s my choice to be the full time parent. Also I have seen women who have just got tired of the relationship wanted something different why should a man pay because she wanted to run off and that life wasn’t good enough for her anymore and there are a lot of women making a dang career on CS I believe school and summers should be switched and no one pays a dime