New York Child Support Guidelines

New York operates under the Income Shares model, one of 42 U.S. states using this framework. For a parent supporting one child, the base guideline applies roughly 17% of income, scaling to 25% for two children and 29% for three. That places New York at rank #33 of 51 states by single-child base percentage. The state caps countable income at $163,000 per month, meaning earnings above that threshold fall to judicial discretion rather than the formula. Median household income across New York is $74,314 annually, which shapes the real-world dollar obligations families face under these percentages.

On the enforcement side, the New York child support program manages 757,000 active cases and collected approximately $1,700 million in the most recent OCSE reporting year. The state's collection rate of 59.8% compares to a national average of 60.6% across reporting states — placing New York at rank #31 of 51 on collection efficiency, and rank #4 by caseload volume (national average: 285,686 cases per state). Paternity is established in 95.9% of New York cases, compared to 94.9% nationally — a critical step because child support orders cannot be enforced without legal parentage on record. Orders are in place for 74.3% of the caseload.

Context matters when interpreting these numbers. A higher percentage-of-income figure does not automatically mean higher dollar obligations — the underlying income brackets, deductions, parenting-time adjustments, and self-support reserves vary meaningfully between states. New York does not build an automatic parenting time adjustment into its formula, though judges retain discretion to deviate. Our interactive New York calculator applies these guidelines to specific income and custody scenarios. Data sources: OCSE FY2022 Annual Report, New York Revised Statutes, and Census ACS 2022.