- Thomas Kaplan and Victoria Mayer
- February 2006
- CSDE3-T-E3
- Link to csde3-T-E3 (PDF)
IRP researchers are interested in knowledge of the pass-through among families who entered W-2 later in the program, after the Child Support Pass-Through and Disregard experiment (CSDE) had ended and all W-2 participants received all current child support paid on their behalf. Because these participants were not part of the CSDE survey, this report relies on an alternative approach to assessing their knowledge, through two rounds of interviews with W-2 and child support agency staff who had contact with them. The interviews were conducted in 2002 and 2005. These interviews suggest that the policy of passing-through all current child support matches the philosophy of personal responsibility emphasized by the state’s TANF program. Respondents in Milwaukee County, which has the largest concentration of families affected by the pass-through, believed that the adoption of the pass-through has increased custodial parents’ cooperation in the establishment of child support. Staff in several counties also noted that the pass-through policy facilitates the efforts of W-2 case managers to build constructive relationships with program applicants. If this is correct, the benefits of the pass-through policy extend beyond the immediate financial gain experienced by families who receive it, helping to improve the cooperation of program participants with both W-2 and child support agency staff.
Categories
Child Support, CSDE, CSDE Report, Pass-Through & Disregard