Fathers awarded custody more often

A New York Times Blog called my attention to Working Mother Magazine on Tuesday called “Custody Lost ,” about the new reality of divorce and child custody for working mothers.

According to articles in this magazine, many women who are the primary wage earners in a marriage are losing custody of their children to their husbands when the marriage ends. Working Mother Magazine says that there are now 2.2 million divorced women in the United States who do not have primary physical custody of their children, and that an estimated 50 percent of fathers who seek such custody in a disputed divorce are granted it.

As the writer Sally Abrahms describes it:

    Not long ago, men usually paid the child support and doled out the alimony. Moms         (working or not) almost always got the kids in messy divorce wars. Years of changing diapers, wiping noses and kissing boo-boos gave them the edge. But now the tide is turning.

    The “tender-years doctrine,” a court presumption that mothers are the more suitable parents for children under 7, was abolished in most states in 1994. And, in large part because of the recession, women are poised to outnumber men in the work force for the first time in American history. Job layoffs affecting more men than women have yielded a burgeoning crop of Mr. Moms.

    “Men are now able to argue that they spend more time with the kids than their working wives do,” says the veteran New York City divorce attorney Raoul Felder. “This is one of the dark sides of women’s accomplishments in the workplace — they’re getting a raw deal in custody cases, while men are being viewed more favorably.”

But look at this from the father's perspective. Did the mom just get a raw deal? Or has the presumption that the parent who is out of the house working harder does less hands-on parenting — a presumption that men have faced for years  — merely been turned on its head to operate against some working mothers?

Either way, the percentage of fathers with primary custody will likely increase, one more example of shifting social views about parenting. And there will be more stories like the one Abrahms tells of Julie Michaud was the primary support for her family. She ran her own business, while her husband who had been unemployed for years cared for the couple’s 7-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter. As Abrahms writes:

    Julie sat helpless as Mark’s lawyer argued that he was the one who arranged the playdates, took the kids to the pediatrician and volunteered at their schools. Affidavits from teachers and neighbors attested to his hands-on involvement in their daily lives. Meanwhile, Julie’s long hours at work meant that people in the community didn’t witness just how much parenting she did out of view. No one saw the lunches she packed every morning, the all-nighters she pulled when the kids were sick. “If I could have done things differently,” Julie says today, “I would have made myself supervisible.”

After a brief hearing, Julie received the bad news from her lawyer a couple of days later. She'd get her children on Wednesdays, Fridays and alternate Saturdays. In addition to paying child support, she was also ordered to pay her husband $450/week in spousal support.

As the economy worsens, many mothers are working more. Many, if not most of the jobs that are being lost are in construction trades and other male-dominated work force areas. Does this mean that more mothers will be in jeopardy of losing custody?

Here is some sound advice from Barbara Glesner Fines, a noted law professor at the University of Missouri–Kansas City School of Law. She says that many of us are looking at custody the wrong way and that “The question shouldn’t be ‘How can I get or win custody?’ but rather ‘How can I make sure this re-formed family will function in a way that is good for the kids?’ Divorce is just the beginning of a lifetime of parenting your children with this other person. You’ve got to make that work.”

Review some of the legal terminology here and check to see if your state is one that has enacted statute with a presumption in favor of joint custody.

Comments

[JD]

This is a great blog and something that we don't see enough of frankly. Not enough visibility is given to this issue and men should know that they have a very good chance of winning custody if they have been involved in their childrens lives and are truly the better parent to fulfill their needs.

[child custody agreement]

I recently came across your blog and have been reading about child custody agreement. I thought I would leave my first comment. I don't know what to say except that I have enjoyed reading. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.

[Joemaflage Familyrights]

I find it interesting that the papers try to turn this into a gender war. The real issue here is negative federal incentive funds. WE fund the courts to produce negative outcomes thru Title IV of the social security act. Most pf the stats I have seen show that mothers get sole custody with minimal visitation for the fathers a little over 80% of the time. In the vast majority of these the fathers have some overnight parenting time around 4 to 6 a month a few have supervised visitation and a few have no visitation or parenting time. When I look at the stats I see a lot of FIT parents who have a minimal amount of parenting time so I asked why would the courts minimize a fit parent? If these parents were unfit I would think they would not have any overnights with the children.
This issue is not a gender war like the article would push but rather an issue of funding. The system is accustomed to giving custody to 1 parent and minimizing the other so that it can collect more money thru higher child support orders and high conflict court actions that lasts till the child ages out of the system. Most of the pawns of the courts are use to the mother being the winner and the father and children the loser in this winner take all setup. At the end of the day the courts do not care which parent gets the kids they will make sure the higher wage earner is stuck with a high child support order which means minimizing time with the children to justify thier own funding. Single parent homes are destructive to our children and society not to mention a high cost to the taxpayer. Equal parenting time as the default between fit, willing, and able parents is the only way to end the destruction of our families.

[Joemaflage Familyrights]

Here is a little something I sent to our Reps. along with the responce from my own Rep. Valentine who has not signed onto the pending equal parenting legislation. I have many more stats on hand if you would like them just send me a message, but I think these get the point across.
This site has a few ideas to minimize the negative funds of Title IV as well. http://nationwideblueprint.com/

>>> 6/4/2009 10:51 AM >>>
I would like to provide you with some information concerning the roots of criminality. I would hope you agree that it is counter productive to hack at the branches of the problem, while leaving the roots intact. The root, in this case, is single parent homes brought about by family court decisions which separate parents from their children in order to extort child support from them. The reason for that is the federal incentive program which pays states for collecting child support, and pays judge for hearing child support cases. We believe that the most effective attack on the roots of criminality would be to implement equal parenting legislation to do away with high conflict divorce, and eliminate the federal programs which make single parent households profitable to the courts yet costly to the taxpayer. (Title IV of the social security act specifically Title IV-D and Title IV-E are the most counter productive sections)

Joe Jurecki
8661 Cook st
Montague MI 49437
1-248-757-0184

37.8% of single mothers are divorced, 41% never married, and only 6.5% widows. Brookings Institute, "Assessing the Impact of Welfare Reform on Single Mothers", Part 2, 3/22/04

"The strongest predictor of whether a person will end up in prison, is that they were raised by a single parent". C.C. Harper and S.S. McLanahan, "Father Absence and Youth Incarceration", Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Assoc., San Francisco, CA, 1998

In 1996, 70% of inmates in state juvenile detention centers serving long sentences, were raised by single mothers. Wade Horn, "Why There Is No Substitute For Parents", IMPRIMIS 26, NO.6, June, 1997

72% of juvenile murderers, and 60% of rapists came from single mother homes. Chuck Colson, "How Shall We Live?" Tyndale House , 2004, p.323

70% of juvenile delinquents, and 70% of Child murderers, come from single mother homes. Richard E. Redding, "It's Really About Sex", Duke Univ. Journal of Gender Law and Policy, Jan.1, 2008

"After controlling for single motherhood, the difference between black and white crime rates disappeared." Progressive Policy Institute, 1990, quoted by David Blankenhorn, "Fatherless America: Confronting Our Most Urgent Social Problem," New York, Harper Perennial, 1996, p.31

71% of all adolescent chemical/substance abusers, 80% of all prison inmates, came from single mother homes.
Bob Ray Sanders, "Hey Y'all, Let's Fill The Hall (Of Fame), Ft. Worth Star Telegram, Oct.28,2007 Mona Charen, "More Good News Than Bad?", Washington Times, Mar.16, 2001 (citing Bill Bennett, "The Index of Leading Cultural Indicators: American society at the end of the 20th Century., New York, Broadway Books, 1994)

Children brought up in single mother homes are:

9 times more likely to drop out of high school, 10 times more likely to abuse chemical substances,
14 times more likely to commit rape,
20 times more likely to end up in prison, Chuck Eddy, "The Daddy Shady Show", Village Voice, Dec. 31, 2002

"(I)n a recent study by the Baltimore-based Annie E. Casey Foundation. Comparing statistics for its Kids Count report, the organization reported that Detroit ranks No.1 in unmarried births among the nationâ€Ts 50 largest cities. Of the 16,729 babies born in Detroit in 1997, 13,574 were black, 1,679 were white and 817 were Hispanic. Seventy-one percent were born to unmarried mothers. This compared with a state average of 33 percent and a 50-city average of 43 percent."

Detroit is the worst offender on our list of America's most dangerous cities, thanks to a staggering rate of 1,220 violent crimes committed per 100,000 "

In 2003, there were 1.5 Million unwed births, and less than 1% were put up for adoption. Fagan and Fitzgerald (above)

Only 4% of college graduates have illegitimate children, and only 16% of college graduates get divorced, compared to 46% of high school dropouts, who marry in smaller numbers to begin with. Dr. David Popenoe, "The Future Of Marriage In America; "The Frayed Knot - Marriage in America", The Economist, May 26, 2007

50% of single mothers are below the poverty line, their children are 6 times more likely to be in poverty than children with married parents. Chuck Colson, "How Shall We Live", Tyndale House.

The illegitimacy rate went up more than 300% since 1970. House Ways and Means Committee, Nonmarital Births to Adults and Teenagers and Federal Strategies to Reduce Nonmarital Pregnancies, appendix "M", 2003

www.myspace.com/familyrights

http://www.youtube.com/user/joemaflage

www.youtube.com/familyrights

From: Dist091@house.mi.gov
Subject: Re: The roots of criminality
To:
Date: Wednesday, June 17, 2009, 11:03 AM

Dear Joe,

Thank you writing to me concerning equal parenting and the roots of criminality.

I believe it is important for both parents to be involved in their children's lives.

Again thank you for your concern in this very important matter.
Sincerely,

Representative Mary Valentine