Elaine Sorensen

Getting to Know Poor Fathers Who Do Not Pay Child Support

About 2.5 million nonresident fathers are poor and do not pay child support. Most of them face multiple employment barriers, just like poor custodial mothers, but are significantly less likely than those mothers to participate in work‐support programs such as training, education, job search activities, or income security programs. Without access to work‐support programs, these fathers will remain unable to provide the financial support that their children need. Given that Congress expects poor nonresident fathers to support their children, it may want to consider directing work‐support programs to them so that they can fulfill their financial obligations to their children.

What explains the continuing decline in labor force activity among young black men? 1

In this paper we show that employment rates among less-educated young black men in the US continued their long secular decline in the 1980s and 1990s. We review a range of potential causes of this problem, including weak schooling, persistent discrimination, declining real wages and the disappearance of blue-collar jobs. For the 1990s, we also focus on two fairly new developments: the dramatic rise in the numbers of young black men with criminal records and the rise in child support enforcement upon low-income non-custodial fathers. We also discuss the implications of these findings for policy.

Welfare Reform and Low-Income Noncustodial Fathers

Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA) fundamentally altered our government support system for needy families. It replaced the federal entitlement to Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC, or welfare) with time-limited support, increased work requirements, and strengthened child support enforcement. The intent was to bolster work and child support, creating two pillars of private income that will enable singleparent families to move from dependency on welfare payments to self-sufficiency. Concerns about this welfare reform act have focused on the plight of poor mothers with custody of their children. Overlooked are the likely effects of the new law on the noncustodial fathers of these children, many of whom also have low incomes.