The Great Divorce Divide – Unfair Policies for Poor Parents

A troubling practice prevalent in the US legal system is the incarceration of poor parents who fail to pay child support.

The Office of Child Support Enforcement reports that approximately 70 percent of unpaid child support debt is owed by parents who either have no or very low earnings. It is becoming more and more evident that a great divide is emerging between the rich and the poor with respect to divorce and co-parenting.

While upper and middle class couples seeking divorce have several psychological, financial and parenting resources at their disposal, the same is not true for the low-income parents. Poor families seeking resolution in court often find the system going against them.

“Many states have two systems, one for married parents and one for poor people/welfare cases that are funnelled through ‘paternity dockets’ where they barely get to say a word,” says Yulia Hatcher, a professor of law at the University of Baltimore and a prolific researcher of and advocate for child support reform. “It’s a tribunal that’s just about child-support and paternity. It’s crowded. Judges are jaded. They face huge caseloads.”

As divorces increase, rushed decisions are also becoming more common for poor families. A non-custodial parent may get the chance to explain in court that he is unemployed or is falling behind other payments etc. but it is totally up to the judge to rule that if the parent is earning minimum wage, then he is obligated to pay the custody amount to the other parent. However, the non-custodial parent is already lagging behind and has a gap between his income and his expenses. Eventually, he will fall behind his child support payments and his child support debt will start to accumulate.

Some states have very tough laws regarding missed support payments. Some terminate parental rights while others throw the parent in jail. For example in South Carolina, a court can fine the parent $1500 and jail him for up to a year. In Texas, a parent can be incarcerated even if he pays back his debt.

In some cases, driver’s licenses are also revoked, often making it even more difficult for the parent to work. It is clear that the system is not working for poor families. The polices are driven by cases where parents are working, are from the middle class income group but applying the same policies to the low-income group seems to be completely unfair and illogical.