As a general rule, an individual with complete information will act in a manner that maximizes personal wealth/income. This is because most people believe that money leads to happiness, at least indirectly. For some, money is its own reward; for others it is a means to an end, giving them the ability and freedom to realize their dreams. In either case, the "pursuit of happiness" often entails the pursuit of wealth. There are of course exceptions to this rule, e.g. individuals who sacrifice a second income to spend more time with their children. However, this second income doesn't always net very much after taxes, especially when daycare is factored in, so once again, economics remains a good predictor of human behavior. This has striking ramifications for even the best democracy, as legislators trade favors for campaign contributions. See the article Big Money And Politics, by Bartlett and Steel, Time Magazine, February 7, 2000.
There is no reason to assume the adoption industry is immune to these economic forces. Its agencies, both private and public, want to maximize profits. If waiting children are placed in permanent adoptive homes as a result, so much the better. However, if it is cheaper to keep a child in foster care for years, that's probably what the agency will do; it is difficult to oppose these relentless economic forces. We the people can either redirect behavior by passing laws, or change the financial incentives. In some cases the latter is more effective. This holds for most industries, and even private citizens, as illustrated by the tax code, which gently encourages us to save for our retirement, without forcing us to do so.
Is the adoption industry in need of reform? I believe the answer is "yes". The behavior of foster/adoptive parents, case workers, adoption agencies, and even state governments is often pushed in the wrong direction by economic incentives that can and should be changed.
I propose three significant fiscal reforms: a regressive payment schedule for foster parents, federal funding for foster care and adoptions, and per-placement compensation (i.e. bonuses) for social workers. Let's begin with foster parents.
Reimbursing parents for their foster children is a delicate balancing act. Too little, and the parents cannot meet the child's physical needs. Fostering and adoptions should not be restricted to the rich. However, if the payments are more than adequate, each foster parent is encouraged to take on many children. The more foster kids, the more profitable the "business" becomes. I am personally familiar with a foster parent (unmarried) who had 7 foster children at one time, plus two birth children. Bear in mind, foster children arrive with many problems -- my adoptees are no exception -- and it is irrational to think that anyone could take on six or seven of these kids and do a good job. Needless to say, the children were neglected, and were eventually removed from the home. The foster reimbursement schedule makes these tragedies almost inevitable.
I cannot suggest any specific dollar amounts, but I would propose a regressive pay scale for foster parents. In other words, as a foster parent, you are paid well for the first child you take into your home. It's not enough to make a living, but it's a good amount -- more than a foster parent receives today. You receive less money for the second child, and even less for the third, and so on. Thus you cannot "make a living" by collecting a large group of foster children. Regressive payments that are initially generous, for the first child, will encourage a large number of private citizens to take in one or two foster children each, while discouraging the mass accumulation of foster kids in fewer households.
We must also consider appropriate funding levels for the adopting parents. Although it is not well known outside the industry, a parent who adopts a special needs child receives financial assistance until the child is 18. Even though my adoptees are legally mine, i.e. no longer in foster care, I still receive a check every month. The size of the check is determined by the severity of the child's preexisting conditions. Personally, I'm happy to cash these checks -- I could use the financial help. But again, a parent should not try to make a living by adopting a dozen special needs children. Like foster care, each additional adoptee should bring in proportionally less money for the household.
This regressive payment schedule encourages parents to "do the right thing", but it encourages state agencies to do the wrong thing, because it is now cheaper to place more children in fewer households. To avoid this bias, our state agencies must be insulated from the costs of their decisions. In other words, a social worker should place a child in a particular home because that is in the child's best interest, whereupon the state pays the bills without question, thus underwriting the decisions that are made at the local level. The state may reward an agency for streamlining its procedures, but cost-cutting should not influence placement decisions.
Even without the aforementioned fiscal reforms, state governments, and hence their subordinate adoption agencies, already face a more serious economic bias. As described earlier, the state pays for the child's care until age 18, whether that child is adopted in-state, adopted out to another state, or in permanent foster care. The only way to dodge these payments entirely is to put the child back with his or her original birth family. Judges and social workers already have an emotional bias in favor of the birth parents; they don't need an economic incentive as well. When the child can be returned to his or her original home safely, and in a timely manner, that is a win-win situation. However, we cannot ask the child to wait forever while the birth parents undergo months/years of treatment and counseling. After a year of foster care, the agency should either return the child, or terminate parental rights and look for an adoptive home. This is a profoundly difficult decision, yet it must be made for the sake of the child. Those children who should be legally free for adoption deserve a fair hearing, free of fiduciary influences. Somehow each state must maintain an economically neutral environment for its adoption agencies. The child can be returned to his or her birth home, or placed in the best possible foster/adoptive home, without regard to costs. This "blank check" policy can be difficult to implement in practice, especially for the poorer states. Economics has a tendency to seep in through the cracks. Therefore, we might want to fund foster care and adoptions at the federal level. This puts some distance between the social worker and the people who will eventually absorb the costs of her placement decisions. The child's welfare becomes the sole criterion.
Of course any time money passes through the federal government we lose a certain percentage to bureaucracy and inefficiency, so this solution is certainly not perfect either. Still, it may be the only way to guarantee an economically neutral environment for our adoption agencies and their employees, who must make life-changing decisions every day. It also promotes equality among the states, which is probably appropriate when ensuring the future of our country's waiting children.
Finally we turn to the social worker, who usually receives a flat salary for services rendered. This form of compensation promotes, or at least tolerates, apathy. I propose a bonus, or commission, for each successful placement. This system rewards the majority of dedicated agents, who are already working diligently to move children out of foster care and into permanent loving homes. It also encourages the unproductive agents, a small yet troublesome minority, to perform, or move to another industry. The chain leading to an adoption is long, and it is only as strong as its weakest link. One disinterested judge or case worker can delay an adoption for months, despite the best efforts of everyone else involved.
Our adoption included its share of frustrating delays. For starters, interstate paperwork was sometimes sent via third class mail, which wasted valuable time. In one instance, a document was "lost in the mail", and could not be traced. Eventually it was found, and the glacier began to move again. Three weeks later we made a few more phone calls, only to find that our forms were sitting on somebody's desk, and he was on vacation for two weeks. "Can't somebody else sign it?" I begged. When I go on vacation, I pass my corporate responsibilities on to someone else, and if there is an emergency, I always leave a phone number where I can be reached. The adoption industry doesn't work that way. We finally convinced his secretary to locate him, and get his signature via fax, but then we ran into another snag, a missing birth certificate. This can delay an adoption for months! In this case we were extremely fortunate. Our county judge waved this requirement and signed our adoption papers, provided the certificate would be delivered to him in a timely fashion. He didn't (legally) have to do this, and most judges don't. In a nearby county, the judge is notorious for delaying adoptions. He demands that all the i's be dotted and the t's crossed, for the "good of the child", because "these rules are there for a reason!" Sometimes an adoption sits on hold for weeks simply because he hasn't gotten round to signing something.
While I waited for documents to move among various agencies, I received tearful phone calls from my future adoptees. "Daddy, when are you coming to get us?" The social workers didn't have to hear these pleading voices, nor the judges; just me. And every time I tried to move the system along, I was roundly criticized. Near the end, my children began to question the promises that had been made. "I don't think you're ever coming. It's all a big lie." How could I tell them that we must remain on opposite sides of the Mississippi River until somebody locates and signs a piece of paper? When I told various agents that time was of the essence -- that my children were being harmed by the plodding pace of the adoption industry -- I was told, in no uncertain terms, that it was their therapist's job to "calm them down" during this "difficult transition". And I certainly ought to keep my mouth shut, until I was given the green light to go get my children. Meantime I should just wait passively and listen to my children cry on the phone. As you might imagine, I did not sit quietly by like a good little boy. I pushed and shoved, and demanded accountability from each individual, making more than a few enemies along the way. This advanced the placement by at least two months. If you talk to any other adopting parent, you will hear the same story. There are a few individuals in the chain who simply don't care, and their apathy and/or incompetence can delay an adoption for months, while the child's precious youth is squandered.
Most of these problems would disappear over night if agents were paid on commission. The real estate industry sets the example. If a realtor doesn't work hard, the commissions are few and far between. That is why a good realtor: actively recruits buyers and sellers, keeps the cell phone or pager on during the day, checks for phone messages every evening, offers to work weekends if that will help, sends paperwork by fax or next-day air, coordinates lending institutions and title companies, and tracks the status of the entire transaction from start to finish. If we want our social workers to take a global perspective and work with a sense of urgency, we can either route the children's pleading phone calls to them (impractical), or pay them on commission.
This is a radical change -- would it create more problems than it solves? Reasonable people have raised objections to this proposal. Below are some legitimate concerns, along with my responses.
Only a judge can terminate parental rights, and he receives no reward for doing so. Furthermore, those who advise the judge in these matters (the investigators) are often different from those who are responsible for placing the child in an adoptive home. Thus those who make the decision to remove a child from the birth home do not benefit from the (eventual) placement commission. If (in a smaller agency) the same agent advises the judge, and then places the child for commission, the judge must seek advice from an independent source, or better still, visit the home himself. Judges often make life-changing decisions on children they have never met -- an aspect of our legal system that we must fix as soon as possible.
I would not pay the commission until the adoption was final. In my case, that was a year after placement, with monthly followup visits from a social worker, to make sure the placement was going well. Therefore, the agent must make a good match, or the placement won't last a year, the adoption fails, and the agent receives no money.
Realtors already work under those conditions. Some houses sell in a few days, but most take months to close, and some sit on the market for a year or longer. Yet realtors continue to work towards a sale. I believe adoption agents will also work hard for a substantial reward in the distant future.
The commission should be based on the child's preexisting conditions. It sounds dehumanizing to place a dollar value on various disabilities, but remember, it's already being done. Adoptive parents (myself included) receive subsidies and Medicaid benefits commensurate with the child's needs. The agent's commission could be set accordingly.
Most of the fiscal reforms described in this article require neither federal oversight nor interstate cooperation. One state -- any state-- can offer placement bonuses, and watch its waiting children fly off the roles. We hope that state legislators and adoption supervisors will consider the effects of economics on foster care and the adoption process. In many cases, economic forces introduce biases that are not in the child's best interest. We need to understand these forces, and modify them where feasible. When financial incentives encourage agents to act in a child's best interest, the child benefits, and in twenty years, we all benefit.
This is the last article in the series. Click here to visit the author's home page.