Child Support Statistics
Wisconsin Child Support Statistics
- Wisconsin support orders are 14.7% of median of all the states.
- 90.2% of fathers with joint custody pay the child support due.
- 79.1% of fathers with some visitation pay the support due.
- 66% of all support not paid by non-custodial fathers is due to inability to pay.
- 46.9% of non-custodial mothers totally default on support
- 50% of mothers see no value in the father's continued contact with his children.
- 40% of mothers reported that they had interfered with the father's visitation to punish their ex spouse.
These and more can be found below or at http://www.bennett.com/gender/childsupport.htm
Child Support Facts and Figures
Average Monthly Child Support by State, 1993:
| 1 | California | $1154 |
| 2 | Delaware | 1117 |
| 3 | Massachusetts | 1098 |
| 4 | North Dakota | 1087 |
| 5 | Wisconsin | 1064 |
| 6 | Illinois | 1050 |
| 7 | New Hampshire | 995 |
| 8 | Connecticut | 962 |
| 9 | Tennessee | 905 |
| 10 | Hawaii | 894 |
| 11 | Michigan | 884 |
| 12 | Vermont | 878 |
| 13 | DC | 875 |
| 14 | Arkansas | 858 |
| 15 | Indiana | 853 |
| 16 | Montana | 852 |
| 17 | Pennsylvania | 849 |
| 18 | New York | 831 |
| 19 | Mississippi | 793 |
| 20 | Georgia | 764 |
| 21 | West Virginia | 739 |
| 22 | Louisiana | 728 |
| 23 | New Mexico | 728 |
| 24 | New Jersey | 725 |
| 25 | Minnesota | 725 |
| 26 | Rhode Island | 723 |
| 27 | North Carolina | 718 |
| 28 | Maryland | 711 |
| 29 | Alaska | 703 |
| 30 | Virginia | 700 |
| 31 | Minnesota | 700 |
| 32 | Kentucky | 689 |
| 33 | Nebraska | 689 |
| 34 | Alabama | 685 |
| 35 | Washington | 681 |
| 36 | Colorado | 680 |
| 37 | Missouri | 679 |
| 38 | Ohio | 679 |
| 39 | Oregon | 670 |
| 40 | South Carolina | 664 |
| 41 | Florida | 651 |
| 42 | Wyoming | 630 |
| 43 | Iowa | 624 |
| 44 | Idaho | 604 |
| 45 | Kansas | 593 |
| 46 | Nevada | 589 |
| 47 | Utah | 589 |
| 48 | Texas | 579 |
| 49 | Oklahoma | 573 |
| 50 | Arizona | 546 |
| 51 | South Dakota | 502 |
Median - $723
California is 160% of median.
Source: National Center for State Courts, Calculations by Law Offices of Craig Candelore, San Diego, CA. 1993.
Support, Custody, and Work
- 79.6% of custodial mothers receive a support award
- 29.9% of custodial fathers receive a support award
- 46.9% of non-custodial mothers totally default on support
- 26.9% of non-custodial fathers totally default on support
- 20.0% of non-custodial mothers pay support at some level
- 61.0% of non-custodial fathers pay support at some level
- 66.2% of single custodial mothers work less than full time
- 10.2% of single custodial fathers work less than full time
- 7% of single custodial mothers work more than 44 hours weekly
- 24.5% of single custodial fathers work more than 44 hours weekly
- 46.2% of single custodial mothers receive public assistance
- 20.8% of single custodial fathers receive public assistance
(Technical Analysis Paper No. 42 - U.S. Dept. of Health & Human Services - Office of Income Security Policy, Oct. 1991 - Meyer and Garansky)
Support And Custody
- 90.2% of fathers with joint custody pay the support due
- 79.1% of fathers with visitation privileges pay the support due
- 44.5% of fathers with no visitation pay the support due
- 37.9% of fathers are denied any visitation
- (1988 Census "Child Support and Alimony: 1989 Series P-60, No. 173 p. 6-7)
- 66% of all support not paid by non-custodial fathers is due to inability to pay (U.S. General Accounting Office Report GAO/HRD-92-39FS January 1992)
- 50% of mothers see no value in the father's continued contact with his children. (Surviving the Breakup by Joan Berlin Kelly)
- 40% of mothers reported that they had interfered with the father's visitation .... to punish their ex spouse. (Frequency of Visitation ....Stanford Braver, Ph.D. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry)
- 63% of youth suicides are from fatherless homes (U.S. D.H.H.S., Bureau of the Census)
- 90% of all homeless and runaway children are from fatherless homes
- 85% of all children that exhibit behavioral disorders come from fatherless homes (Center for Disease Control)
- 80% of rapists motivated with displaced anger come from fatherless homes (Criminal Justice and Behavior, Vol. 14, p. 403-26, 1978)
- 71% of all high school dropouts come from fatherless homes (National Principals Association Report on the state of High Schools)
- 75% of all adolescent patients in chemical abuse centers come from fatherless homes (Rainbows for all God's Children)
- 70% of juveniles in state operated institutions come from fatherless homes (U.S. Dept. of Justice, Special Report, Sept 1988)
- 85% of all youths sitting in prisons grew up in a fatherless home (Fulton County Georgia jail populations & Texas Dept. of Corrections 1992)
Children in Fatherless Homes:
- 5 times more likely to commit suicide
- 32 times more likely to run away
- 20 times more likely to have behavioral disorders
- 14 times more likely to commit rape
- 9 times more likely to drop out of school
- 10 times more likely to abuse chemical substances
- 9 times more likely to end up in a state operated institution
- 20 times more likely to end up in prison
22% of American children are in fatherless homes
- 11,268,000 total custodial mothers
- 2,907,000 total custodial fathers
(Current Population Reports, U.S. Bureau of the Census, Series P-20, No. 458, 1991)
Child Support Totals
- $14,800,000,000 total chid support owed
- $11,100,000,000 total child support payed
(Current Population Reports, U.S. Bureau of the Census, Series P-123, No. 173, 1988)
Gender Bias in the Santa Clara and San Mateo County Court
Where BOTH mother and father asked for FATHER custody the court awarded custody to the mother 12.3% of the time (Dividing the Child: Social and Legal Dilemmas of Custody - Harvard Press, 1992 - Eleanor MacCoby (Stanford Psychology) and Robert Mnookin (Stanford Law) from a survey of nearly 1,000 divorcing couples in San Mateo and Santa Clara counties)
Percentage of children in single parent families, by year:
| 1950 | 7.1 |
| 1955 | 11.1 |
| 1960 | ---- |
| 1965 | 9.8 |
| 1970 | 11.3 |
| 1975 | 16.1 |
| 1980 | 18.9 |
| 1985 | 21.0 |
| 1988 | 21.6 |
| 1989 | 21.9 |
| 1990 | 22.2 |
| 1991 | 22.9 |
| 1992 | 24.0 |
(U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P-20, Household and Family Characteristics, various years; and Marital Status and Living Arrangements: March 1988-1990, Nos 433, 445, and 450)