Mia Hakovirta

Child maintenance and child poverty: A comparative analysis

This article uses the Luxembourg Income Study datasets from circa 2004 to analyse the contribution child maintenance makes to the reduction of child poverty. The countries compared are Canada, UK, USA, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Finland representing countries with different child maintenance schemes. Results show that the contribution that child maintenance makes in reducing overall child poverty is minimal but it can reduce child poverty among non-widowed lone mother families if maintenance is received. Countries guaranteeing child maintenance payments by the state are more effective in reducing child poverty. This article uses the Luxembourg Income Study datasets from circa 2004 to analyse the contribution child maintenance makes to the reduction of child poverty. The countries compared are Canada, UK, USA, Germany, Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Finland representing countries with different child maintenance schemes. Results show that the contribution that child maintenance makes in reducing overall child poverty is minimal but it can reduce child poverty among non-widowed lone mother families if maintenance is received. Countries guaranteeing child maintenance payments by the state are more effective in reducing child poverty.

Family Policy and Shared Parenting in Nordic Countries

Increasing diversity in patterns of responsibility for the raising of children in families has presented serious challenges for welfare states. More complex family ties raise questions about the types of responsibility and obligation that should follow from different forms of private relationship, and the role the welfare state should play in governing family life. In this article, we compare how family policies in Finland, Norway and Sweden define parental responsibilities for supporting a child when its parents do not live together. We are particularly interested in whether the principle of Nordic family policy, shared parenting, operates when parents do not live together but raise their child together. Do parents have an opportunity, for example, to share family policy benefits, and if they have, what are the conditions under which this can be realised? Comparative examination shows variation between the logistics of Nordic family policies. Norwegian and Swedish family policy systems are flexible, and family policy there enables parents to share benefits in a way that supports shared residential arrangements. In Finland, however, the situation of parents living apart but sharing the daily care of their child has been given insufficient attention and family policy has still not been developed.

A Comparative Analysis of Child Maintenance Schemes in Five Countries

The aims of this special issue were twofold: to provide international research evidence of child maintenance schemes in five countries and to produce a comparative analysis of that research, to show how child maintenance outcomes differ across countries. The research data were collected using a vignette technique. This set up two fictional families, specifying sets of characteristics in order to explore how child maintenance schemes deal with key factors. Decision processes and payment outcomes are explored for applicants who are, for example, lone parent families on low incomes, divorcing families on middle incomes or reconstituted cohabiting families where a new child is born to the non-resident parent; the effects of changes in employment status and shared care arrangements are also considered. This final paper provides a comparative analysis of the vignettes to show how child maintenance outcomes differ across countries, and summarises the key themes that emerge from the individual country papers. Ultimately, the comparative analysis demonstrates that we have only scratched the surface in understanding similarities and differences internationally across child maintenance schemes. This is partly because of the complex interaction between child maintenance schemes and social security systems, which is not always transparent.

Children's Rights and Parents' Responsibilities: Child Maintenance Policies in Finland

Child maintenance schemes differ substantially from each other in terms of underlying philosophy, structure, rules and organisation, and in particular, in their very different outcomes. In Finland the principle is that every child has the right to be adequately provided for and that child maintenance is the right of the child. The main policy focus is on shared parenting and the emphasis in the scheme on contact between the child and the non-resident parent emerged in the 1980s. Furthermore, supporting children is seen as a collective responsibility, and this means that at least part of the maintenance is normally guaranteed by the state if the non-resident parent does not pay maintenance. Guaranteed maintenance also covers children without non-resident parents. Calculations show that the maintenance determination guidelines operate on the basis of equality, as both parents are held to be responsible for the childs maintenance in accordance with their abilities, regardless of custody and residence arrangements. Still, the records on overdue maintenance payments and maintenance debts indicate that non-compliance remains a problem in Finland.

Contribution of child maintenance to lone mothers’ income in five countries

This study uses the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS) data from 2013 to study (1) the contribution of child maintenance to the income packages of lone mothers, (2) the proportion of lone mothers receiving child maintenance and the level of child maintenance for those receiving it and (3) the extent to which child maintenance is helping families who may need it the most (those at the low end of the income distribution), compared with families with moderate or higher incomes. Our analysis covers data from five countries: Finland, Germany, Spain, United Kingdom and the United States. Our results show that in all countries except the United Kingdom, labour income is an important source of income for lone mothers and less than 40 percent of income comes from social transfers. Child maintenance contributes significantly to the income of lone mothers, particularly in Spain, followed by the United States and Germany. We find the highest coverage of child maintenance receipt in Finland. In the other countries, only one-third of lone mother households receive child maintenance. The median amounts of maintenance are the lowest in the United Kingdom and Finland, but there is great variation in the level of child maintenance within countries. The comparison of the quintile groups reveals that in the United States, the lone mothers in lowest income quintile do not seem to benefit as much from child maintenance compared with the highest income quintiles, whereas in Finland, Germany and Spain, more lone mothers in the low-income quintiles receive maintenance. However, amounts are quite equal across income quintiles.

Welfare State Support of Lone Parents — Nordic Approaches to a Complex and Ambiguous Policy Issue

Changes in family structures and family life, such as the growth in lone-parent families, joint custody and shared parenting arrangements are creating new and multifaceted challenges for the capacity of the welfare state. In managing and regulating this complex issue, policymakers need to adjust traditional policies to allow for changes in the social conditions of today’s children and parents, including changes in setting the boundaries between the state and the family and in encouraging labour supply of all men and women. The chapter examines the extent to which Nordic family policy systems acknowledge policymakers’ need to adjust traditional policies to allow for changes in the social conditions of today’s children and parents, including changes in and responses to increasing diversity in the family as well as the form of their response. The question driving this chapter is to what extent are the Nordic countries adapting to changes in lone-parent families.