Child Support Enforcement and Domestic Violence Angela Fertig Irwin Garfinkel Sara McLanahan Prepared for the Fragile Families Summer Data Workshop 2004

Question Does stricter child support enforcement increase domestic violence among non-cohabiting couples? Stricter CSE Father ’ s contact and stress Mother ’ s bargaining power

CSE also affects fertility and cohabitation decisions, e.g. If M ’ s incentive dominates, more non-cohabiting couples in strict CSE states In strict states, bigger and “ better ” pool of non-cohabiting Fs Selection Bias Stricter CSE M has incentive to not cohabit F has incentive to cohabit “ bad ” cohabiting not cohabiting Strict CSE “ good ”

What makes Fragile Families ideal? Sample of non-cohabiting mothers from different states Rich set of variables: Violence Child support (effect should differ by status) Welfare (effect should differ by status) Unique controls (like father ’ s jail time) Baseline father characteristics to control for selection into non-cohabiting sample (Like father ’ s commitment)

Sample All mothers at baseline: 4898 All mothers at follow-up: 4365 Married: 1275 Cohabiting: 1264 Not cohabiting: 1800 Non-cohabiting mothers who were romantic at baseline or follow-up 1120

Prevalence: Violence, Order, Welfare

Means: Demographic Controls

Means: More controls

Selection Controls: Father ’ s commitment

Results: CSE increases violence Seriously Hurt after the birth Hit/Slap after the birth CSE.004 (.003).006* (.003).008* (.004).014** (.005) selection controls XX N