Most Western European legal systems contain a rule obligating adult children to support their parents, which derives from a Roman statute promulgated at the time that the extended family system was disintegrating and the nuclear family emerging. Such maintenance does not appear to be inconsistent with contemporary social circumstances and kinship relationships. But those for whom it is invoked are highly vulnerable people excluded from the social security system. Although the amounts of maintenance ordered under this rule are small, such orders create problems for the aged, their children, the responsible agencies and their employees. The result is a social paradox: the rule purports to motivate families to care for their aged parents, but the families upon whom the obligation is imposed actually suffer from such imposition.