Child support payments help ensure that single-parent families have adequate economic resources and are less likely to depend on government benefits. They may encourage noncustodial parents’ involvement in their children’s lives, improve child outcomes, connect noncustodial parents to work, and discourage single parenthood. However, fewer than half of poor custodial single parents have a child support agreement in place, and the share is lower than it was 20 years ago. Moreover, the gap between what is owed and what custodial parents receive is large and has increased.

Require single parents to cooperate with the child support enforcement system as a condition of receiving benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), Medicaid, and subsidized childcare. Currently, cooperation is a nationwide requirement to receive Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) benefits, optional for states in SNAP, and not a feature at all for Medicaid and childcare subsidies. The same exemptions in place for TANF (e.g., parents at risk of domestic violence) should apply to these other programs. All money collected from noncustodial parents should go to custodial parents rather than being used to recover government costs. SNAP benefits could be increased by $50 per month if a single-parent family had a child support order in place.