Men and Child support. What is the answer?

I bought up my 3 children alone, maintenance payments were something I had heard of, but never experienced. I have the greatest of respect for absent parents who support their offspring. The children deserve not less!

I do however wonder what this world is coming to nowdays, when fathers who work lots of overtime, or study hard and work their way up the ladder are penalised for doing so, while the ex lives a much better easier life with no money worries!

Children can be expensive, no doubt about it, but I feel that mothers often get too large a slice from men. It seems that judges and the csa feel children are entitled to designer clothes, expensive electronics etc, while taking away fathers motivation for bettering themselves and working hard.

This seems to be a problem in 2 parents families too. Children just have too much of everything unimportant, but not enough of the things that really matter. If a child has decent shoes, tidy clean clothes that fit, bed, bedding etc, some toys, books, a bike and lots of LOVE and ATTENTION, the child will thrive! So why is that judges decided to fleece fathers to ensure children can have the things they don't need? Expensive clothes are no longer for the wealthy, tvs in every room is not a luxuary nowdays. Women know if they have a baby with a hard working man who is not self employed, they will be looked after financially for 18 years.

I think the term professional mothers is very apt, for a large percentage of women,after all you can earn more by having babies than some who have a degree!!!!!!!!!

I don't know how the system could be worked to ensure fairness to all concerned, but I see friends go through this, men and women on opposite sides of the situation and despair at the way our world is set up.

I feel for all men in this situation, but my sympathy, is reserved for those who didn't choose to have a child, but were trapped or tricked and will pay financially for trusting the wrong women for ever!

I think the answer is to make both parents pay everything equally.

Housing & Utilities
Price of Mortgage/Rent divided by the number of people living there (1 kid & 1 parent) and then for each "kid" portion of the rent, divide that by 2. The parent paying the support must pay that amount to the parent receiving the support

For example:

$1000/mo rent / 3 (1 parent + 2 kids) = $333/each
$333 + $333 = $666
$666 / 2 (# of kids) = $333 is what the parent paying the support should pay to the parent receiving the support

You would then do the same for utilities. Cable, internet, & cell phone bills should not be included in mandated support because they are 'luxury' items

Medical
If one parent is paying for the insurance, the other should incur all other costs (co-pays, non-covered expenses, etc.)

Car payment & Insurance & Fuel
This should not be paid for by the parent paying the support because the parent receiving the support would need a car regardless of whether he/she has children

Misc. Expenses; clothes, school activities, etc.
All should be split 50/50

So, that's my answer. If two adults make a child, they need to care for it.

And one more thing... if at any point the parent receiving the support gets remarried, or has a live-in partner, the parent paying the support should then have his/her payments reduced to 33% from 50%

reply to post by cassp83


Your logic on the rent and utilities is unsound. The mother has to pay those bills anyway, even if she is living alone. The additional cost to have a child living there as well amounts to a few extra pennies a day.

you can "if your paid up" claim all your children once every three years and yes the ex has to let you. its the law.

As I mentioned before, the maximum allotment for food stamps is $200 a month, or a little less than $50 a week. Now considering that kids do not eat as much as an adult, particularly not as much as a giant such as myself who has survived on food stamps, such an allotment might be considered generous for a child. Now of course, we must divide that amount by two, which comes out to $25 a week that the father should be obligated to paying, if of course he has claimed parental rights in the first place that is.

Now, we can go ahead and tack that other $25 back on to the total per week as an allotment for other things such as pencils for school, or the pennies per day extra for the child's share of utility use such as water for baths.

There is no reason why any father should be paying much more than $200 a month in child support.

D.C. police officer charged with woman’s murder after she and baby are found dead

...Phillips, a vice officer who joined the D.C. police force in 2003, was arrested by Prince George’s police Friday and charged with first-degree murder. A family member said Phillips, who is being held without bond, lived in the county’s Temple Hills area with his wife of 13 years and their 12-year-old daughter.

Wright, an aspiring Prince George’s sheriff’s deputy, also lived in Temple Hills. She filed a court petition in February seeking to have Phillips declared the father of her daughter, Jaylin Wright, who was born June 6, 2010. She also asked the court to order Phillips to make child support payments and provide health insurance for Jaylin.

Wright was found dead Thursday on the ground in Oxon Run Spring Valley Park, about a mile from Phillips’s home, authorities said. They said Jaylin was found elsewhere in the park, dead in a car seat in Wright’s green 2008 Saturn Vue...

reply to post by CobraCommander

Dads not the Demons

Recent data from the Department of Child Protection in Western Australia has debunked a common misconception about fathers and violence. The data shows that natural mothers are far more likely to abuse children than their natural fathers, other than in sexual abuse, where mothers were responsible for only 13% of cases. The past practice of lumping together de factos, live-in boyfriends and overnight male guests together with fathers as “male carers” has led to skewed beliefs about who abuses children. In releasing these recent figures that identify natural fathers separately, the DCP has provided a clearer picture of who is likely to abuse children.

The figures - obtained under Freedom of Information provisions - provide a clearer picture of who is likely to abuse children in families. The data show that there were 1505 substantiations of child abuse in WA during 2007-8. Natural parents were responsible for 37% of total cases. Of these, mothers are identified as the perpetrator of neglect or abuse in 73% of cases, including over 50% of cases of physical abuse.

Micheal Woods, an academic from the University of Western Sydney, said:

“The data is not surprising – it is in line with international findings regarding perpetrators of child abuse. And the figures do undermine the myth that fathers are the major risk for their children’s well-being”.
www.fathers4equality-australia.org...

Emphasis mine

fathers4equality have been fighting for shared parenting for many years.

The CSS needs a massive overhaul.Though it always falls on deaf political ears.
Edit (and reply toCobraCommander) ..

It made me wonder if in bizzaro world that fathers were the ones who had custody more often than not and the mothers had to pay for two households and if they couldn`t keep up with the expense at any time over 18 years they were sent to jail etc as the fathers do,that there would be alot more mothers killing their children?,more than fathers do today,basing it on the findings in the above link.

reply to post by CobraCommander


.........or a couple hundred dollars a month!!! I can post links to the various sized apartments that are available currently in my area if you like....
or here.....
roanoke.craigslist.org...
just compare the lowest rents the ones that are in roanoke or salem.....
ya, you can go way out in the boonies and get something cheaper, but well, you will just blow your savings buying gas to get to work!!
and well, there's a few areas in the city you really don't want to bring your kids in, I mean I lived in one area where there was a tree growing across the street that had a small hole in it, and well, it was used as a drop off point for drugs.....every couple of days you'd see cops with dogs going up and down the street, smelling around...heck if they came and asked one of us, we'd have told them, or maybe that is why they were smelling around, someone already had...
and a few times every week my son would be pulled over on his way out of the neighborhood on his way to work!! I starve myself to death is the money that was saved would keep me from moving my kids in some of these neighborhoods!

but even if you look in those neighborhoods the price between a small effieciency and a three bedroom (little girls and little boys can't sleep in the same room, it's illegal!!!) , there's a few hundred dollar difference....

a family of four was getting close to 400 a month in food stamps in new york a decade or so ago, imagine it's more now....ya, for a single person, you don't get much, but they seem to feel that the kids being fed properly is more important. oh, and well, if those kids are young enough, there is also wic....to help with milk, cereal, cheese, and a bunch of other stuff.....
the only starving kids out there are from working families who don't make enough to feed their kids, or are just too darned proud to ask for the help!

Originally posted by cassp83
I think the answer is to make both parents pay everything equally.

Housing & Utilities
Price of Mortgage/Rent divided by the number of people living there (1 kid & 1 parent) and then for each "kid" portion of the rent, divide that by 2. The parent paying the support must pay that amount to the parent receiving the support

For example:

$1000/mo rent / 3 (1 parent + 2 kids) = $333/each
$333 + $333 = $666
$666 / 2 (# of kids) = $333 is what the parent paying the support should pay to the parent receiving the support

You would then do the same for utilities. Cable, internet, & cell phone bills should not be included in mandated support because they are 'luxury' items

Medical
If one parent is paying for the insurance, the other should incur all other costs (co-pays, non-covered expenses, etc.)

Car payment & Insurance & Fuel
This should not be paid for by the parent paying the support because the parent receiving the support would need a car regardless of whether he/she has children

Misc. Expenses; clothes, school activities, etc.
All should be split 50/50

So, that's my answer. If two adults make a child, they need to care for it.

And one more thing... if at any point the parent receiving the support gets remarried, or has a live-in partner, the parent paying the support should then have his/her payments reduced to 33% from 50%

edit on 4-6-2011 by cassp83 because: add

You're right. Unfortunately, that would actually BE equality. This is NOT what the government OR women truly want. The women want everything for themselves and the government wants them to have it all as well. They want to have it all at the expense of men and just CALL it equality. Why are women NOT paying 50%? Because the government says they don't have to...ONLY MEN because this is a conspiracy against the white middle-classed male. Yeah right.....equality. Women get everything in court, dictate relationships because the guy fears divorce the whole time he is married. he always has the threat of losing it all. The only threat a woman has in marriage is gaining it all in a divorce.

Oooooh, it must be terrifying for a woman to get a divorce and GAIN IT ALL!. It is better NOT to marry a woman today....the marriage is nothing but a prison (always fearing what you will lose if she doesn't get her way,, like the spoiled brats they have been raised as in America these days.) and usually when you get married she will find SOME reason to divorce you, because women benefit more from divorce than with marriage.They will even psychologically screw with you and even cheat on you to sucker you into divorcing her yourself because then they don't have to contend with their guilt of knowing how evil they are. To her, if YOU offer the divorce....then she has rationalized it as YOUR fault......the cheating and lying and manipulation is not factored into her rationalization process. They do that inherently. Women get married.....pop out a couple of kids and they are set financially for life. HOW's THAT FOR EQUALITY MEN? Now we all know this to be true. Courts will help women get anything they want from a man and then ask his broke @ss for money he doesn't even have. Pay child support, Alimony, medical for the child, (if he goes to college) pay for that too as well as any other incidentals they can think of. You know what the women have to do? NOTHING!!!! Sit on their @sses and just spend your child money...usually on something stupid ...LIKE THEMSELVES, and then come to you wanting more money while threatening to take you back to court to get it....CAUSE SHE KNOWS YOU'LL HAVE TO PAY THE COURT COSTS AS WELL.

Wake up men, how long must this go on and how long are we going to coddle and try to charm ourselves into these black hearts while getting nothing in return? Yeah, we get tempted and manipulated into thinking were going to get sex for doing this or that or being a gentleman or whatever else reason....but it doesn't happen does it men? On average, it doesn't work...usually you have to get them drunk first and even then they are dead lays. Women today can't cook, aren't good in bed (unless you pay them), statistically carry more STD's than men (from all the cheating), .....let me make a wild guess...most guys reading this, your girlfriend/wife has told you that they have only had like 1 or 2 partners in life before they met you .....am I right? A classic lie of a cheater/people person (hint) in the closet. If your GF/Wife has told you this....it's a blatant lie to gain your trust and to make you feel secure in the relationship, so they can then go and cheat on you behind your back and you won't suspect a thing, because you think you're woman is the exception of all other cheating women...you think you have a chaste woman and her plan has worked. She has gained your trust with a lie and is now free to decieve you. You had better watch a woman that says these things even more than most. She's up to something. Word to the wise, if you get them drunk.....don't live in the same town...and don't give them your real name and you can use them and not have to pay them anything. Yes....I am suggesting that we men start manipulating women to balance out equality. Fight fire with fire. They play dirty...you play dirty. It's only fair. What do they do to women during divorce.....even if she cheated on you and the reasons for the failed marriage are all her fault? I'll tell you what they do to women.........THEY REWARD THEM WITH ALL YOUR STUFF AND PUNISH YOU BY LETTING HER HAVE SOLE CUSTODY OF YOU CHILDREN TO USE TO TRY TO CONTROL YOU.

This women's liberation and equality movement is all just BS to me. Women don't want equality they want it all! ,......and the government is helping them get it. Now ask yourself........why is the government helping them crush the will of men? No fighters................No America. Thanks to the women of America...there will soon be NO America like we used to know with freedoms etc. There will only be a police state and they will have to live in it once they have been betrayed. Once the NWO is installed....they will have no more use for female favoritism and will turn on them like a pit bull with rabies. Watch!

reply to post by eccentriclady


I think part of the problem in envy by some custodial mothers who receive a pitance or nothing at all compared to other mothers who receive alot more; thus the jealousy.

In Australa and Canada.....and I'm sure it's the same in the UK because our laws are almost identical.....the % is worked out based upon both parent's earnings.

To tell you the truth, the only solution is for everyone to keep their legs closed and be very picky when decided who to have sex and children with.

I realize that this solution is utterly unrealistic based on our sex craved society, genetics, and cultural inability to learn compromise with our spouses.

I think Men shouldn't pay any child support if the mother is not going to use it to truly provide for the kid's needs.
For example, my Dad paid so much child support and my sister and I never saw a cent of that besides maybe food. I basically wore her 50+ year old handy down clothing, was socially isolated (I spent five weeks a summer alone in the house without talking to anyone), while she let a 20 year old move into our house and knowingly sleep with my 16 year old sister. She even bought them a big bed for them to be together.

I have no clue what she did with the $2,000 dollars a month my dad gave her. All I know is that it did not go to us or get us ahead in life. Luckily, my dad fought and fought then got custody of me.

reply to post by CobraCommander


You can't come up with one formula fits all. Why? Because the day to day livings costs are subject to which state you live in and if you live in a city or urban area.

The fact remains.....a majority, meaning more than 50% of non-custodial fathers do not like paying child support OR only want to pay what they think they should pay.....meaning as little as possible.

I beginning to understand the greatest problem among some of you men on this thread is most of you not only don't like paying child support but have severe trust problems with your ex wives; surely you must had trusted her to be with her for the years you both were married! That tells me perhaps some of you are mirroring your own deep guilt on to your ex wives that broke down the marriage in the first place? Or is it that there is a whole lot of animosity towards your ex wives...there's no emotional closure. Or perhaps because they have moved on while you're still struggling with your own raw emotions (the thought of her bedding another man or suddenly she no longer has to be answerable to you and she's no longer forced to be dependant on you?) ? It's amazes me how much a man can turn love in to hate so quickly. I'm yet to hear one nice story about an ex wife on this thread and I would bet on it they are not all as bad as you make out. They cook and clean for your children and I assure you most of them are doing no different within their homes as they did for the years you both were married except they just don't have a husband there to support them. At some point in their lives, a minority of ex wives WILL move on and venture in to new relationships however a majority of ex husbands do remarry AND are able to pick themselves up alot quicker financially than their ex wives.

Yes, I think there is alot of guilt raging among you.....probably deep regret too.....

so the ex wives and children should to suffer for that?

reply to post by Hurst22


What a load of rubbish your post is. I'm a businesswoman and you are telling me you don't know how to prove you don't make $6000.00 a month? Try showing the judge your business sales/expenses ledgers!!! Or perhaps you are afraid they'll find out you do creative book work?

I believe ALL non-custodial fathers in self employment should automatically be audited by the Tax Dept.

reply to post by cassp83


If the custodial parent remarries, the non-custodial parent should pay less? Why should the step-parent be financially responsible for someone else's kids?

reply to post by CobraCommander


Thats rubbish because if I did'nt have 3 children, I'd be living in a small 1 bedroom unit, not a 4 bedroom house....and all my utilities/food would be dramatically reduced! Hell, I'd be very well off in no time at all.

reply to post by dawnstar


You are correct.....

I have a daughter and two sons.....one of my boys with a moderate disability. The daughter needs her own room and I have to keep the boys spilt up because of one of my son's disability; he used to disrupt his brother at godly hours of the night affecting his school work.

reply to post by Phenomium


Then stay away from all women! You hate them....don't go near them!

reply to post by bluemirage5


As should custodial mothers,who "USE" the childs funds for their "OWN " means,IE; Boyfriends,clothing for themselves,expensive autos,drugs,and anything NOT relating to the child. MHO

reply to post by sonnny1


You are assuming all single mothers are doped out, alcoholics, wear designer clothes, and have casual sex!

In fact, 54% of all single mothers are DIVORCED who lead very normal lives no different to that of a married woman.

Problem with many of you men, you seem to think all single mothers are whores. Thats the stigma they are tagged the moment they walk out of the family court. Thats NOT the case at all. A majority of single mothers do right by their children and live good clean lives.....and you men just hate that don't you!

Originally posted by dawnstar
reply to post by CobraCommander

 

.........or a couple hundred dollars a month!!! I can post links to the various sized apartments that are available currently in my area if you like....
or here.....
roanoke.craigslist.org...
just compare the lowest rents the ones that are in roanoke or salem.....
ya, you can go way out in the boonies and get something cheaper, but well, you will just blow your savings buying gas to get to work!!
and well, there's a few areas in the city you really don't want to bring your kids in, I mean I lived in one area where there was a tree growing across the street that had a small hole in it, and well, it was used as a drop off point for drugs.....every couple of days you'd see cops with dogs going up and down the street, smelling around...heck if they came and asked one of us, we'd have told them, or maybe that is why they were smelling around, someone already had...
and a few times every week my son would be pulled over on his way out of the neighborhood on his way to work!! I starve myself to death is the money that was saved would keep me from moving my kids in some of these neighborhoods!

but even if you look in those neighborhoods the price between a small effieciency and a three bedroom (little girls and little boys can't sleep in the same room, it's illegal!!!) , there's a few hundred dollar difference....

a family of four was getting close to 400 a month in food stamps in new york a decade or so ago, imagine it's more now....ya, for a single person, you don't get much, but they seem to feel that the kids being fed properly is more important. oh, and well, if those kids are young enough, there is also wic....to help with milk, cereal, cheese, and a bunch of other stuff.....
the only starving kids out there are from working families who don't make enough to feed their kids, or are just too darned proud to ask for the help!

edit on 5-6-2011 by dawnstar because: (no reason given)

Most of what you wrote there is irrelevant. Bad neighborhoods, living out in the sticks, makes no difference. That is the mother's problem and her choice to decide where to live. If she has to move out to the boonies to be able to get a two-bedroom place for the same price as an efficiency in the city, that is her responsibility to do so, and part of the choice she made when she decided to become a mother. It is not the man's responsibility to maintain the woman or the child in a certain lifestyle. Why should a man have to pay for her house in the suburbs, leaving him only able to afford a bunk in some crack-den hostel?

But thanks for bringing up about food stamps being $400 for a family of four. This only goes to show that with more people in the household, cost per person actually DECREASES. So going by food stamp standards, I get $200 a month as an individual. If I had three children, I would get another $200 per month. Which leaves the father of three children responsible for about $50 per week for ALL THREE children, going by the same standard that welfare applies.