Child support statistics from the live extract
Key findings from the 51-jurisdiction guideline registry and Title IV-D enforcement fields. Registry facts and agency-reported rates, not advice about any individual order.
- 51
- Jurisdictions
- 84.3%
- Income Shares
- 10
- Verified calculators
- 31 pt
- Orders gap
The extract in one line
Of 51 jurisdictions, 43 (84.3%) use Income Shares; the OCSS cases-with-orders share runs from 95.1% in Alaska to 64.1% in Arkansas (31 points).
According to PlainChildSupport's state guideline dataset.
- 43
- Income Shares jurisdictions
- 10
- Verified calculators
- $26.4B
- Distributed collections
- 31 pt
- Cases-with-orders gap
Not legal advice. Confirm current guidelines and orders with your state agency or counsel.
Key findings
Standalone, citable statements from this extract. Free to reuse with attribution to PlainChildSupport (CC BY 4.0; cite the page).
- 51 US jurisdictions (50 states + DC) sit in this guideline registry with a published one-child base percentage and Title IV-D enforcement fields from the OCSS FY2023 preliminary extract.
- 43 jurisdictions use Income Shares (84.3% of 51). 5 use Percentage of Income and 3 use Melson. Model labels are statute classifications, not predictions of any individual order.
- 10 of 51 jurisdictions have interactive calculators on PlainChildSupport that we have verified against the published guideline schedule. The other 41 remain guideline pages with official links, not invented worksheets.
- 31 pt gap separates Alaska's cases-with-orders share (95.1%) from Arkansas (64.1%) on OCSS Table P-64. That field is the share of the Title IV-D caseload with a support order established, not a dollar collection rate (the collection-rate column is empty in this extract).
- 25% is Vermont's published one-child Income Shares base rate, the high end of that model in this extract. Washington sits at 13%. Rates are not comparable as dollars without each state's income schedule.
- $26.4B in distributed collections across 11,877,092 Title IV-D cases in this OCSS snapshot (sum of state enforcement_collections_m). Dollar totals are agency-reported distributed collections, not private orders outside IV-D.
- $4.2B is Texas's reported distributed collections (1,488,340 cases), the largest single-jurisdiction volume in this extract.
- $1,122 is the ACS-income index for Texas's Percentage-of-Income one-child rate (20% times ACS median household income / 12). Mississippi is the floor at $568. This index is for cross-state context only; Income Shares states do not apply their percentage to median household income.
Two cuts of the same extract
Model counts are statute classifications on 51 jurisdictions. The gauge is the Income Shares share of that set.
Guideline formula models
51 jurisdictions (50 states + DC)
Income Shares share
43 of 51 jurisdictions
Source: Office of Child Support Services (OCSS/ACF) FY2023 Preliminary Data Report (ACF Form 157) cases-with-orders and distributed collections, plus NCSL/state guideline schedules and Census ACS median household income · 2026 Cases-with-orders is OCSS Table P-64 (share of Title IV-D caseload with an established support order). The collection-rate column is not populated in this extract. The Percentage-of-Income ACS index multiplies published one-child rates by ACS median household income for cross-state context only.
Highest cases-with-orders shares
Top jurisdictions by OCSS cases-with-orders percentage in this extract.
Cases with a support order established
Title IV-D caseload share (OCSS Table P-64)
How to read these numbers
According to the Office of Child Support Services FY2023 preliminary data report (January 2024), nearly 11,900,000 Title IV-D child support cases were open across the 51 jurisdictions tracked here, with distributed collections exceeding $26,300,000,000. Four populations stay labeled here: (1) the 51-jurisdiction guideline registry sourced from each state's published statute; (2) formula-model counts (Income Shares, Percentage of Income, Melson); (3) OCSS Title IV-D fields from Tables P-64 and P-82; (4) the Percentage-of-Income ACS income index, a derived context number, not a statutory worksheet. Always verify current guidelines before relying on a single cell. See methodology and the rankings boards.
Download the jurisdiction snapshot: child support statistics CSV (CC BY 4.0).
Every figure on PlainChildSupport is rendered directly from official state guidelines and federal enforcement data, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.
PlainChildSupport publishes state guideline data and federal enforcement statistics for informational purposes only. It is not legal or financial advice, a calculator result is not an order, and every state allows deviations a court decides case by case, so confirm any figure with the state child-support agency or an attorney before you rely on it. Appropriate use.