We know that broken families are not a good thing. We know divorce is on the rise. We know that single parent families are increasing. But, we may not realize the cost to the taxpayer of someone else’s divorce or single parent family.
Leah Ward Sears is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia. In this interview Chief Justice Sears and Dr. Ben Scafidi, Professor of Economics, Georgia College and State University in Milledgeville discuss the findings and significance of a recent study by Dr. Scafidi.
The cost for Georgia taxpayers: $1.4 billion annually. The cost to taxpayers nationwide: $112 billion annually.
You can read the report or a summary at American Values.Org or at the Georgia Family Council.
If you wonder why taxpayers pay such a high cost, the answer is simple, while the solution is difficult. We all know that it costs more to support a family living in two separate places, whether that is due to divorce or they just never got married. Families that might be living just above the poverty level when they live together, get thrown into poverty when they live separately. Once that happens, one parent and the kids now become eligible for all sorts of government benefits at taxpayer expense. Whether it is food stamps, medicaid, or whatever, these services cost money.
Now the point of all this is not to pick on divorced people or single parent families. The point is that we, the citizens and taxpayers, have a stake in trying to keep families together. It is a question of a dime of prevention being worth a pound of cure. Would we be better off if we invested funds in programs that provided marriage education and counseling, programs geared to keeping families together?
The Supreme Court of Georgia is the appellate court with primary jurisdiction over cases involving divorce and many family matters. It has a substantial concern in improving the success of families and reducing their need to resort to the courts. In 2006 the Supreme Court of Georgia established the Georgia Supreme Court Commission on Children, Marriage and Family Law. The press release announcing the formation of the Commission states:
The Commission will be chaired by Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears and will be comprised of two committees: the Advisory Committee on Healthy Marriages, chaired by Chief Justice Sears, and the Committee on Justice for Children, chaired by Justice P. Harris Hines. Both committees will study the legal consequences associated with the growing fragmentation of Georgia families and make recommendations for addressing their root causes.
Chief Justice Sears has been working on this initiative for over a year and believes that this Commission will make a positive difference for Georgia families. According to Justice Sears, “We must make some drastic changes to prevent further family fragmentation in this state. Moreover, it is crucial that the judiciary establish a clear vision of court procedures and research-based best practices to ensure justice for children now and in the future.”
The Commission, which will be appointed by the Chief Justice, will be composed of leading experts and scholars in law, family dynamics and child welfare, as well as other 2 selected leaders from the public and private sectors. Members will also include (though will not necessarily be limited to) representatives from the following disciplines: members of the Georgia General Assembly, judges from the Court of Appeals of Georgia and the superior, juvenile, probate and state courts of Georgia. In addition, the Commission will include members of the Family Law Bar, educators, social workers, representatives of the Division of Family and Children Services, sociologists and psychologists, and a member of the Georgia Commission on Family Violence.
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The goals of the Advisory Committee on Healthy Marriages are to protect children and improve child welfare by fostering healthy marriages in Georgia as well as to reduce the statewide domestic relations caseload, including cases involving child support enforcement, child custody, paternity establishment and alimony. The Committee on Justice for Children has three primary goals: to establish outcome measures for children within the court system, to improve the quality of legal representation for all parties to juvenile court cases, and to expedite the appeals process for termination of parental rights matters.
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