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BENEFITS AND COSTS OF INTENSIVE FOSTER CARE SERVICES: THE CASEY FAMILY PROGRAMS COMPARED TO STATE SERVICES |
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| Authors: | RICHARD O ZERBE ROBERT D PLOTNICK RONALD C KESSLER PETER J PECORA EVA HIRIPI KIRK O'BRIEN JASON WILLIAMS DIANA ENGLISH and JAMES WHITE |
| Institution: | Zerbe:;Professor, Evans School of Public Affairs, University of Washington, and Adjunct Professor, School of Law, Seattle, WA 98195. Phone 206-616-5470, Fax 206-685-9044, E-mail Plotnick:;Professor, Evans School of Public Affairs, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195. Phone 206-685-2055, Fax 206-685-9044, E-mail Kessler:;Professor, Department of Health Care Policy, Harvard Medical School, 180 Longwood Avenue, Room 215, Boston, MA 02115. Phone 617-432-3587, Fax 617-432-3588, E-mail Pecora:;Professor, School of Social Work, University of Washington, and Senior Director of Research Services, Casey Family Programs, 1300 Dexter Avenue North, Floor 3, Seattle, WA 98109. Phone 206-270-4936, Fax 866-322-7863, E-mail Hiripi:;Doctoral Student, DKFZ-Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany. E-mail O'Brien:;Director of Foster Care Research, Casey Family Programs, 1300 Dexter Avenue North, Floor 3, Seattle, WA 98109. Phone 206-352-4273, Fax 866-321-9665, E-mail Williams:;Research Analyst/Statistician, School of Social Work, University of Alaska Anchorage, 3016 11th Avenue West, Seattle, WA 98119. Phone 206-283-2561, Fax 206-283-2561, E-mail English:;Senior Director, Strategic Consulting, Casey Family Programs, and Research Associate Professor, University of Washington School of Social Work, 2616 Marine Avenue SW, Seattle, WA 98116. E-mail White:;Research Associate, Center for Improvement of Child and Family Services, Graduate School of Social Work, Portland State University, 520 SW Harrison 440, Portland, OR 97201. Phone 503-538-1025, Fax 503-725-8030, E-mail |
| Abstract: | The foster care system attempts to prepare children and youth who have suffered child maltreatment for successful adult lives. This study documents the economic advantages of a privately funded foster care program that provided longer term, more intensive, and more expensive services compared to public programs. The study found significant differences in major adult educational, health, and social outcomes between children placed in the private program and those placed in public programs operated by Oregon and Washington. For the outcomes for which we could find financial data, the estimated present value of the enhanced foster care services exceeded their extra costs. Generalizing to the roughly 100,000 adolescents age 12-17 entering foster care each year, if all of them were to receive the private model of services, the savings for a single cohort of these children could be about $6.3 billion in 2007 dollars. ( JEL D61, H75) |
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