The Effect of Additional Child Support Income on the Risk of Child Maltreatment

About 6 million children were reported to the child welfare system as being at risk of child abuse or neglect in the United States in 2010. Researchers and policy makers have long recognized that children living in families with limited economic resources are at higher risk for maltreatment than children from higher socioeconomic strata, but the causal effect of income, and particularly child support, on maltreatment risk has been challenging to establish; many of the same factors are associated with child support payment levels, poverty, and child maltreatment risk. Using a random assignment experiment that led to exogenous differences in child support received, the present analysis explores the causal role of a full pass-through and disregard of child support on the risk of child maltreatment. We find that a full child support pass-through, as compared to a partial pass-through, reduces the risk of child maltreatment.