The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 and its Impact on Single Parents

The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 was signed into law by President George W. Bush on February 8, 2006. It was designed to curb mandatory expenditures by the federal government, and a large portion of it was geared toward cutting back on future Medicaid and Medicare spending. However, three sections of the legislation also have a direct impact on America's single parent families.

Primarily by cutting into the funds available to your local office of child support enforcement. Here's a breakdown of how The Deficit Reduction Act (DRA) will directly influence spending on behalf of local child support enforcement programs:

1. By eliminating the opportunity for state-run child support enforcement offices to receive federal match dollars on incentive payments


2. By reducing the federal match rate for laboratory fees related to genetic (paternity) testing


3. By imposing a mandatory $25 annual per-case fee, which most states are passing on directly to their clients

As a result, billions of dollars in child support will go uncollected. According to a report released by The Lewin Group (which was contracted by The National Council of Child Support Directors to determine just how the cuts would impact local child support enforcement programs), at least $11 billion dollars will be lost in the next ten years - and that's a positive outlook for the future of child support enforcement, based on the hope that individual states might be able to come up with one-half of the lost federal dollars on their own.

You can show your support for the Child Support Protection Act of 2007, a bill which would restore funding to your local office of child support enforcement.

How do you do that exactly? It's simple. You can show your support for the Child Support Protection Act of 2007 by contacting your local representative, which you can do quickly and easily, right here online, when you visit the The National Women's Law Center.