Georgia Forms new Child Support Commission
House Bill 221 became law April 22, 2005. Overhauling Georgia’s child support calculations. Effective January 1, 2007, the new formula considers both parent’s income instead of just the non-custodial parent’s, and allows for adjusting child support according to the amount of time the child(ren) are with each parent. The Commission to oversee it’s administration held its first meeting June 1, 2005.

Next Meeting: Friday, February 15, 2008, 1pm, Capitol, Rm 125. Public invited.

Constitutional Challenges to Previous Guideline
Click here and select “Georgia Constituional Challenges.”

Georgia’s Child Support Guidelines: No Economic Basis. Facts for a Constitutional Challenge [PDF] State Bar of Georgia, Family Law Section Newsletter, July/August 2000, pp. 14-23.
Stilll a useful paper for Wisconsin style states. Georgia’s original child support guidelines – which increased as a share of net income as income increased – conflicted with all economic studies on child costs.  It also conflicted with the underlying study from Wisconsin upon which it is based.
    This results in large financial windfalls to the custodial parent a significant portion of which is the tax offsets given entirely to that parent, rather than shared, although child costs are a joint statutory obligation.
    Use of obligor-only percentages also means that a presumptive award did not account for family income. For low-income obligors, Georgia's presumptive awards push the obligor below the poverty.

Testimony before the 2001 Georgia Commission on Child Support [PDF] by R. Mark Rogers, economist, June 1, 2001.
Highlights the origin of Georgia’s original child support guideline, its lack of economic basis, flaws in the Income Shares guideline that is used by 36 states, and the better alternative, a cost sharing guideline. The model is discussed extensively as the economically appropriate methodology.