The Two-Income Trap - Elizabeth Warren [123]
34 About one in seven never-married mothers specifically identify the reason for their bankruptcy as “divorce/family breakup.”
35 Federal law restricts wage garnishment for child support at 50 percent of disposable income when the payer is supporting another spouse or dependent child, and 60 percent of disposable income when, as in the case of Brad, the payer is unattached. Consumer Credit Protection Act (CCPA), 15 U.S.C. 1673(b)(2) (2003).
36 Calculated from data in Daniel R. Meyer, “The Effect of Child Support on the Economic Status of Nonresident Fathers,” in Fathers Under Fire, edited by Irwin Garfinkel et al. (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1998), p. 87; see also Cynthia Miller, Irwin Garfinkel, and Sara McLanahan, “Child Support in the U.S.: Can Fathers Afford to Pay More?” Review of Income and Wealth 43 (September 1997): 274.
37 Sanford L. Braver, Divorced Dads (New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 1998), p. 33.
38 Irwin Garfinkel, Sara S. McLanahan, and Thomas L. Hanson, “A Patchwork Portrait of Nonresident Fathers,” in Fathers Under Fire, p. 52.
39 Miller, Garfinkel, and McLanahan, “Child Support in the U.S.,” p. 274.
40 Garfinkel, McLanahan, and Hanson, “A Patchwork Portrait,” p. 54.
41 Braver, Divorced Dads, p. 33.
42 Weitzman, The Divorce Revolution, p. 391.
43 See, for example, Miller, Garfinkel, and McLanahan, “Child Support in the U.S.,” pp. 261, 274, and 276.
44 Elaine Sorensen, “A Little Help for ‘Deadbeat’ Dads,” Washington Post, November 15, 1995.
45 Ann Crittenden, The Price of Motherhood (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2001), p. 153.
46 Under a typical support arrangement, Justin would pay roughly 18 percent of his income, or $7,020, bringing his income to $32,000 while Kimberly’s rises to nearly $36,000. This would put Justin at 3.6 times the poverty level, while Kimberly and her two children would live at 2.6 times the poverty level. Under the Share-the-Pain approach, in order for Justin, Kimberly, and the children to all live at the same level (roughly three times the poverty level), Justin would need to pay $12,400 in child support, so that Kimberly’s income (including child support) would rise to $41,200 while Justin’s would drop to $26,600. See note 29 above for additional information about these calculations. The poverty level is calculated from Bureau of the Census, Table 21, Poverty Thresholds by Size of Family and Number of Related Children, 2000. Available at http://ferret.bls.census.gov/macro/032001/pov/new21_000.htm [3/22/03].
47 Under the Share-the-Pain approach, Kimberly’s postdivorce discretionary income would be $7,770. See notes 29 and 47 above and “Typical budget, four-person family” for “Justin and Kimberly” in note 121, chapter 2 for additional information about these calculations.
48 Sally C. Clarke, Advance Report of Final Divorce Statistics 1989 and 1990, Centers from Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics, Monthly Vital Statistics Report 43, no. 9 (Hyattsville, MD: NCHS, March 1995), Table 19.
49 Lisa Kocian, “Father Continues His Quest to Reform State Custody Law,” Boston Globe, March 17, 2002.
50 In one-third of joint custody cases, no child support is ordered, compared with only 11 percent of cases where the mother is awarded legal and physical custody. Eleanor E. Maccoby and Robert H. Mnookin, Dividing the Child: Social and Legal Dilemmas of Custody (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992), Figure 6.11, Child Support Orders by Custody Arrangement.
51 Garfinkel, McLanahan, and Hanson, “A Patchwork Portrait,” p. 49.
52 Elaine Sorensen, “A National Profile of Nonresident Fathers and Their Ability to Pay Child Support,” Journal of Marriage and the Family 59 (November 1997): 785-797, Table 1.
53 The limitations of the data make it impossible to calculate a precise filing rate for nonresident fathers. The Consumer Bankruptcy