EMBARGOED UNTIL: 12:01 A.M. EDT, APRIL 23, 1999 (FRIDAY)
Public Information Office CB99-77
301-457-3030/301457-3670 (fax)
301-457-1037(TDD)
e-mail: pio@census.gov
Lydia Scoon-Rogers
301-457-3243
One in Three Custodial Parents Without Child Support Are Poor,
Census Bureau Reports
About a third (32 percent) of custodial parents who did not receive the
child support payments awarded them in 1995 were poor, according to a
report released today that was co-sponsored by the Commerce Department's
Census Bureau and the Department of Health and Human Services.
"Custodial parents receiving at least some of the child support they
were owed had a poverty rate of 22 percent," said Census Bureau analyst
Lydia Scoon-Rogers. "In general, 30 percent of custodial parents were poor
in 1995, compared with 16 percent of all parents with children."
The data in this report were collected in the April 1994 and April 1996
supplements to the Current Population Survey (CPS) before passage of the
1996 Welfare Reform Act. In addition, changes to the April 1994 and April
1996 survey questionnaires mean that many of these data are not comparable
with data from the April 1992 CPS and earlier supplements.
Other highlights in the report titled, Child Support for Custodial
Mothers and Fathers: 1995, P60-196, include:
- In the spring of 1996, 13.7 million custodial parents lived with 22.8
million children under age 21 while the other parent was absent from
the home. About 11.6 million (85 percent) of custodial parents were
women and 2.1 million (15 percent) were men.
- About 7 in 10 (4.8 million out of 7.0 million) custodial mothers and
fathers who were due child support payments received at least a
portion of the amount they were owed in 1995. Average child support
received was $3,732.
- The number of custodial parents who received the full amount of child
support owed them increased from 2.3 million (34 percent) in 1993 to
2.7 million (39 percent) in 1995.
- Child support received totaled $17.8 billion of the $28.3 billion due
in 1995.
- The 7.0 million noncustodial parents who owed child support in 1995
were more likely to have made payments if they had either joint
custody or visitation rights. Seventy-four percent of the
noncustodial parents who had these provisions made payments as
opposed to 35 percent for those who did not.
- About 5.9 million custodial parents made 13 million contacts with a
child support enforcement office or other government agency in 1995
for one or more services relating to child support.
The report presents data on parents who have custody of their children
when the other parent is absent from the home. It focuses on the child
support income that custodial parents with current awards received, as
well as other provisions of awards, such as visitation, joint custody and
health insurance.
The data were collected from the redesigned April 1994 and April 1996
supplements to the Current Population Survey co-sponsored by the
Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Child Support
Enforcement. As in all surveys, the data are subject to sampling
variability and other sources of error.
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The U.S. Census Bureau, pre-eminent collector and disseminator of timely,
relevant and quality data about the people and the economy of the United
States, conducts a population and housing census every 10 years, an
economic census every five years and more than 100 demographic and
economic surveys every year, all of them evolving from the first census in
1790.
