American Fathers 4Change with a mission of helping to bring awareness that by increasing the proportion of children growing up with involved, responsible, and committed fathers it will improve the well being of children.
"The man as he converses is the lover; silent, he is the husband." ~ Honore de Balzac
Divorce Corp Director, Joseph Sorge, interviews renowned economist and lead author of a breakthrough study on the costs of raising a child, Professor William Comanor.
Watch this video to learn the shocking facts about how child support costs are currently calculated and why they need to be revised.
Then share this interview with your state legislators to support child support reforms.
Together we can end unnecessary fighting over one of the most contentious aspects of any divorce; child support.
The coauthors of the study are Mark Sarro, Principal of The Brattle Group and R. Mark Rogers, Founder and Principal of Rogers Economics, Inc. Lead author, William S. Comanor is Professor of Economics at UC Santa Barbara and Professor of Health Policy & Management at UCLA. The full paper "The Monetary Cost of Raising Children" published in the journal "Economic and Legal Issues in Competition, Intellectual Property, Bankruptcy, and the Cost of Raising Children" Volume 27, can be found here:
The Men’s Rights Group of Arizona strongly urge you to sign SB 668. This Bill will bring Florida into the 21st Century with Alimony Reform and require shared parenting time.
Florida’s current Alimony Laws are archaic and more closely resemble the family and economic structures of the 1950’s than the realities of the many family forms of 2016. SB 668 will bring economic justice and equal opportunity to divorcing husbands and wives as well as enhancing harmony in the post-divorce family by attenuating conflicts over money.
Your state’s Bill (SB 668) is widely supported in your state and allow for a more equal shared parenting component currently missing in family law. The Men’s Rights Group of Arizona believe Family Law should follow sociological research. One of the most consistently and strongly replicated findings in family social science research is that the children of divorce fare best in family forms that maximize the involvement of both parents in the child’s life. The worst developmental outcomes come from single mother families which are supported by current women headed households.
In 2013, Arizona passed the first joint parenting law in the nation and it has been a great success. The Men's Rights Group of Arizona along with many other organizations have followed this new law and it showed children are thriving as compared to mother headed households.
We strongly encourage our members and others who believe in the necessity of such reforms to contact Governor Scott immediately at:
This letter is written because of my concern to our Family Laws and the 60 million dollar business supporting them: It is my concerns that the laws are causing harm to our children and only help the Lawyers making Thousands in their present form. I understand that the awareness of abuse in the past and that the discrimination against men that they flee from their responsibility of children is the basis that these laws were incorporated, but the facts stated in background listed below shows just the opposite.
Lets deal the facts concerning the first of the incorporation of the understanding of the abuse issue: The mercury reported in 2014 that “the legal system is not the place to domestic violence in majority of cases. Ploughing more money into prosecutors and creating criminal offenses will not assist in dealing with the root causes of family violence”. Science Debunks the “women are the gentler sex”, Medical Daily Jan. 30, 2014, in a symposium (June 25, 2013) on intimate partner violence at The British Psycholical Society”s division of forensic Psychology annual conference found women are more likely to be “INTIMATE TERRORIST” or PHYSICALLY AGGRESSIVE to their partners. Medical Xpress reported that Dr Elizabeth Bates study of 1000 students revealed that just as many women as men could be classified as abusive, coupled with controlling behavior with SERIOUS levels of threats, intimidation, and physical violence. This study also found that women demonstrated a desire to control their partners (and family, children?) And more likely to use physical aggression then men, ”it wasn’t just pushing and shoving”
National Coalition Against Domestic Violence “men and boys (children) are less likely to report the violence. Sixteen percent of adult males who did report being raped or physically assaulted are victims of current, or former spouse, cohabitation partner. Harvard Study 2010, revealed that 70 percent of domestic violence is committed by women against men. 2001 CDC survey of young adult in heterosexual relationships provided answers to violence-related questions Researchers found that women were more likely to insight violence then men. Australian Institute of Family studies, Australia biggest childhood study reveals found girls are more devious then boys in the torment of their classmates. All states in the USA, using the case load and statics from child services, Human resources shows that 70 to 75 % of abuse, neglect, and emotional issues are against the Biological mother (CHECK YOUR OWN AREA).Moving to the discrimination thought that fathers do not accept their responsibility: This idea only hurts the fathers that want to be with and care for their children, fact is that a father who wants his kids in his life WILL HAVE A LIVING ARRANGEMENT THAT ALLOWS THE CHILDREN THEIR OWN ROOMS, WILL BUY SCHOOL CLOTHES AND SUPPLIES, HAS EXTRA FOOD IN HIS HOUSE, PAYS FOR CHILD CARE WHEN HE WORKS, AND HAS ALL THE EXTRA BILLS FOR HAVING CHILDREN. We will discuss this further in child support laws.
For women under 30, who bear two-thirds of all children, that rate is 53 percent.
Many unmarried women are cohabiting with partners at the outset of their children’s births, but those couplings disintegrate at twice the rate of marriages.
By some estimates, this means more kids are growing up with televisions in their bedroom than with both of their biological parents.
Boys are especially affected by this trend. Without positive and consistent male role models, society misses out on much of their constructive potential.
It’s no coincidence 70 percent of male inmates did not grow up with both parents, for example.
Even for those with fathers, the average school-age boy spends just half an hour per week in one-on-one conversation with his father, according to David Walsh, founder of Mind Positive Parenting.
“That compares with 44 hours a week in front of a television, video game screen, [and] Internet screen,” he says. “I think that we are neglecting our boys tremendously. The result of that is our boys aren’t spending time with mentors, with elders, who can really show them the path, show them the way of how it is that we’re supposed to behave as healthy men.”
Across the board, children with intact families have more advantages than their fatherless peers.
A report published by The Center for Disease Control and Prevention says children of married biological parents or adoptive parents are healthier, have fewer definite or severe emotional or behavioral difficulties and are less likely to grow up in poverty.
They also have more friends.
When Gen-Y children were surveyed in elementary school, those who were living with their fathers scored better on 21 of 27 social competence measures.
The gap between rich and poor will keep getting worse as fatherlessness rises among those of lower socioeconomic status.
Children who grow up without fathers are more likely to become single mothers or absent dads, use drugs, have low academic achievement and are less likely to believe in marriage or have successful marriages.
The charts below illustrate this point:
On average, a little over 3 million children in the US receive welfare benefits, known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) or State Supplemental Program (SSP), each month during the fiscal year.
A recent report from Pew Research indicated 18 percent of American adults have received assistance from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), or “food stamps,” at some point in their lives, and Democrats were twice as likely as Republicans to have used food stamps.
Women were about twice as likely as men, and black people were twice as likely as white people to have received food stamps.
People over 65 years old were the least likely age group to say they had received food stamps, while people with less education – a high school diploma or lower – were three times more likely than college graduates to have received those benefits.
Women who marry or maintain a home with the biological father of their children can face the reduction or loss of their benefits, according to the US Department of Health and Human Services:
“Our main finding is that if a male has financial resources, TANF provides the greatest disincentive to form and/or maintain a biological family, and the least disincentive, if not an incentive, to form an unrelated cohabitor family. In a biological family, where the male is the father of all the children, he must be included in the unit and his resources counted.
In an unrelated cohabitor family, where he is father of none of the children, he is not included and his resources are not counted. In addition, most states disregard unrelated cohabitor vendor and cash payments to the TANF recipient and her children.”
In other words, the current structure of TANF actually promotes having nearly any man but the biological father heading the house.
Women are also about six times likelier to get sole custody of their children after separating from their fathers.
In some cases, men even go to jail for falling behind on child support payments.
In South Carolina, for example, about one out of seven inmates are imprisoned for this very reason, and 75 percent of them were unemployed or having trouble finding work.
How sending them to jail will help them, their families, or taxpayers is a mystery.
And. again, for children with fathers, dads are missing out on crucial bonding time.
Children who had frequent and positive interactions with their fathers, such as the father paying attention to the child’s interests, offering encouragement and smiling, during the first year of their lives were calmer and better behaved than other children at age two.
This was especially true for boys.
Involved dads also reduce the chances of their infants experiencing cognitive delays, and fathers themselves feel more confident about their job skills, parenting skills and social relationships.
The US is an oddity among Western nations in not granting statutory paid maternity or paternity leave or providing childcare at a reasonable cost.
This creates a situation where women are forced to choose between work and family (to “lean in” or “lean out”), while men have no option but to “lean in” or just opt out altogether.
These trends paint a very disconnected picture, but that can change.
The government can step up by commissioning a White House Council on Boys and Men.
There is currently a White House Council on Girls and Women, but they have yet to support a similar platform for men, even though it has been proposed and endorsed by a number of experts.
Creating policies that support a father’s right to be present in his children’s lives during divorce and custody battle situations, eliminating perverse welfare incentives for parents to live apart, offering men paternity leave equal to maternity leave, providing childcare for both mothers and fathers and encouraging family members to visit inmates would also be steps in the right direction.
Sponsoring a nationwide male mentorship program to bring more positive male figures into children’s lives would also help reverse these trends.
To be number one, America must strengthen its families, not lead the way in fatherlessness.
[Ed. note: This post originally appeared at Elite Daily and is reprinted here with the author’s permission.]
"So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide. Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and grovel to none. When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision. When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home." (Tecumseh).
American Fathers Liberation: ALL Men’s Rights are Human Rights. ’nuff said http://bit.ly/1JgMgEm
Divorce Corp Director, Joseph Sorge, interviews renowned economist and lead author of a breakthrough study on the costs of raising a child, Professor William Comanor. 
Watch this video to learn the shocking facts about how child support costs are currently calculated and why they need to be revised. 
