Voices on child support
Ron Haskins
Senior Fellow, Brookings Institution
The exact words were found in the primary source linked below (testimony, book page, report or article), at the page given.
"Although these strong child support reforms were fully justified, the combination of doing little or nothing to help poor fathers work while squeezing them relentlessly for child support payments drove many of them underground."
Source
Testimony of Ron Haskins before the Maryland House of Delegates, Committee on Ways and Means, Brookings Institution, 2007-02-22, p. 2 (PDF p. 2) (testimony). Checked 2026-10-13.
Context
State-legislative testimony supporting a Maryland bill (Rosenberg/Kaiser, referred to as Bill 534) to create a state EITC for low-income noncustodial fathers who are current on child support. Haskins defends the 1996 enforcement reforms as justified while arguing that pairing them with no work help for poor fathers had harmful effects.
The passage it comes from
One of the major flaws in the 1996 welfare reform law was that fathers were generally excluded from the work provisions because they do not live with the child. Another section of the 1996 law, however, greatly strengthened the child support enforcement program so that fathers would have an even more difficult time if they tried to evade child support payments. Although these strong child support reforms were fully justified, the combination of doing little or nothing to help poor fathers work while squeezing them relentlessly for child support payments drove many of them underground. Child support payments have increased since passage of the 1996 law (Figure 5), but many fathers have not been able to meet their child support obligation because they have little or no earnings.
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