The “Over-Reporting” of Black Children to Child Protective Services: Are We Doing Equity Wrong?

In the United States, Black children experience high levels of poverty and other risks to their safety and well-being. Black children experience many negative outcomes (e.g., infant mortality) at rates more than double that of than White children. Black children are also almost twice as likely to be reported to and investigated by Child Protective Services (CPS) as are White children. States are seeking to reduce Black/White CPS disparities, with the encouragement of influential foundations and the Department of Health and Human Services. These positions are framed as representing an “equity” perspective. This commentary challenges that framing and argues that it is time for us to move to a true “equity” lens, where the goal is to serve children according to the risks to safety they face, rather than at equal levels. I review the existing national data and scientific literature, which shows a general consensus that Black children are not overreported relative to the risk of maltreatment they face and relative to non-CPS comparison benchmarks. While the framework driving current policy requires we reduce all differences in Black/White CPS report rates, a true equity perspective requires something very different—that we match protective service provision with risk. So long as different races have different levels of vulnerability to child maltreatment, they should receive protective services at different levels.