Child Support Enforcement

Congress established a national child support enforcement (CSE) program in 1965 to ensure that noncustodial parents financially support their children. In fiscal year 2000, the Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) estimated that $84 billion in past-due child support was owed, but never collected. The Social Security Act contains provisions to help child support agencies collect support when noncustodial parents or their income and assets are hard to find. The Act mandates that states enact laws requiring social security numbers (SSNs) on applications for a driver's license. State CSE programs rely on SSNs to locate the addresses, income, and assets of noncustodial parents. Motor vehicle agencies can be a valuable source of SSNs that CSE programs have difficulty obtaining elsewhere. The Act also requires that states suspend, withhold, or restrict the driver's licenses of noncustodial parents delinquent in child support payments. Most motor vehicle agencies that GAO surveyed collect SSNs from all applicants for driver's licenses, but OCSE has taken few steps to promote such collection in states not currently doing so. Although state officials and privacy experts expressed few concerns about motor vehicle agencies collecting SSNs for child support enforcement, possible weaknesses in the policies and procedures in use to safeguard SSNs indicate the potential for compromising privacy. Child support enforcement officials in 35 states told GAO that their agencies use driver's license suspension extensively, which has led to the collection of some payments.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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