Unfair child support laws
Public Comments (14,822)
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Jan 24th, 2013Someone from Mobile, AL writes:
I am a 90% disabled OIF combat war veteran and haven't been able to get a job since I got an honorable discharge from the army in 2008. I just got a court judgement stating that I am to start paying $220.00 a week in child support to my ex-husband for our handicapped child and will have to pay this for the rest of his life!! I am the mother and because of this i will be living on the street or under an over pass very soon. This is a fine way to treat returning disabled veterans!! -
Jan 24th, 2013Someone from Myrtle Beach, SC writes:
I work a minimum wage job with barely 30 hours a week. I barely make 500 a month. I pay 200 of that towards student loans. I live with my parents because I mathematically can't afford rent. Yet I'm expected to pay 20% of my wages to a woman who lied about being on birth control to get pregnant and does not work or I go to jail. Is this the American dream?REPORT COMMENTS
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Jan 23rd, 2013Someone from Staten Island, NY signed.
Jan 23rd, 2013Someone from Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD signed.
Jan 23rd, 2013Someone from Lake Villa, IL writes:
Its sad to see so many men being taken advantage of by greed. So many women lie and cheat in court but they always win. IT IS WRONG! My husbands ex takes him to court at least two times a year for more $ or games to get back at him for moving on when she cheated on him with his best friend. We pay over $900 in cild support. This is not including After school, sports, and medical. His ex has his daughter in four extra curr. activities just to drain his wallet. How unfair to his daughter who is beyond exausted from her mother. The mental games she plays to try and ruin a father daughter relationship is BS. She has put her daughter in therepy to show his daughter should not be here when she coaches and tells her what to say. It is so sad and there should be a law for women like this. The court system thinks because she is the mother she is a better fit. Well yeah when they lie and they believe the stories they say it would apear this way. I have two children from a previous marriage and never asked for anything. He did not want to be a part of my childrens life so I take it as lucky me and I dont have to deal with all this. WOMEN WHO USE THE SYSTEM NEED TO GO TO JAIL. Just as if a man does not pay! STOP THE LIES!REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 23rd, 2013Someone from Mchenry, IL signed.
Jan 23rd, 2013Someone from Logan, OH signed.
Jan 23rd, 2013Someone from Orange, CA writes:
Its un-fair my ex took my kid out of the state and didnt want me to do anything about it now i have another kid and she is coming back 5 years later wanting everything she was owed the courts took all my child support away at the time she left which helped me get in to the house i bought now i am on the verge of divorce and losing my house. Also my wife is also prego with our second kid. Some one needs to help people out that are losing everything in hard times. My kid is in Texas and with what i am paying my 13 yr old can afford her own 4 bedroom house and a nice car WTH!!REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 23rd, 2013Someone from Janesville, WI signed.
Jan 23rd, 2013Someone from Hallandale, FL writes:
Though it is true that both parents should have their fair share of responsibilities in raising children, the current child support laws are absolutely unfair to non-custodial parents. While both parents may be unemployed, especially in these tough economic times, the non-custodial parent has all the pressure to absolutely come up with his or her own basic (rent and food) expenses to survive along with usually high support amounts that are extremely difficult to lower. On the contrary, the custodial parent suffers from the only pressure of surviving, but with the full welfare amount and children's allowances. True, children are at threat of living in dire poverty when living in a single household, but so is the non-custodial parent. The removal of professional licenses, drivers' licenses, passports, and the threat of imprisonment on one of the parent are absolutely unfair and counter-productive. They remove all chances from the non-custodial parent to look for work and find one. On the other side of the spectrum, they actually create an incentive for people to divorce in the hope of getting money from the non-custodial parent. Also, when support amounts are too high to afford to even survive, a non-custodial parent has more incentive to hide away, cut ties, make underground money, or even kill themselves--if they feel absolutely trapped by that situation, than if support were affordable and based on the actual income of the non-custodial parent. With these harsh laws, the government may indeed recover money but only artificially, as typically the non-custodial parent borrows money, further compelling the problem of poverty and future non-payment of child support, or simply ends up in jail, also compromising any future chances of recovering money or employment. Money, as we all know, has never raised nor loved children, but it certainly is the greedy person's driving force for immorality. So please, please, absolutely revise those harmful laws, or else do not get involved.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 23rd, 2013Someone from Janesville, WI writes:
One father owes 23,000,has job and filed taxes but im not getting his refund. He also does not claim his other kids that by law he is allowed to but does not because he knows it could be paid and taken for support. The other father owes 11,000 and has never filed taxes!! How do they get away with never filing?! How can they even get a drivers license being so far behind? It should affect their credit just as my bills affect my credit if not paid on time...come on!REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 22nd, 2013Someone from San Antonio, TX writes:
I have no problem supporting my child at all. But with these payments I can barely support myself and my credit is down the drain. I will probably never be able to bounce back from this.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 22nd, 2013Someone from Los Gatos, CA signed.
Jan 22nd, 2013Someone from Buffalo, NY signed.
Jan 22nd, 2013Someone from Bonaire, GA writes:
We need to put everyone in political office on notice. Fix these illegal child support laws now or be considered part of the problem and be marked for disposall come elections.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 22nd, 2013Someone from Baltimore, MD signed.
Jan 22nd, 2013Someone from Stroudsburg, PA writes:
The system is broken.. Period. I'm paying an outrageous amount of child support to my cheating ex wife who also makes decent money. My support was based of some overtime I had gotten in the summer which is gone now. I'm on the verge of bankruptcy while my ex is living the high life spending all the support money on her new bf. I can't even afford to feed my son when he's with me. Apparently I'm payin 60% of what it costs to raise him, my figureis more like 200% and she pays nothing. She should be equally responsible for costs of raising him.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 21st, 2013Someone from Alabaster, AL signed.
Jan 21st, 2013Someone from Corwith, IA signed.
Jan 21st, 2013Someone from Davidson, NC signed.
Jan 21st, 2013Someone from Minneapolis, MN writes:
I had married a man I thought was going to be for life. Over the years he kept getting fired from jobs. Then he got his masters in business administration and started working a decent job. During this time he had multiple women. We had 2 children. Come 2004 he got fired from his management job for illegal activity. I was working 2 jobs to keep the roof over our heads. I'm a home care nurse with clients who are on life support. 2005 after he didn't work for a year he filed for divorce and got the order for child support. The magistrate accused me of ducking work (even though I was working 2 jobs). My ex husband waited to sign the divorce contract until 2007 when the law changed in Minnesota and went from parenting time to gross income to determine child support. He has still been fired from jobs since. I'm working steady. We are shared legal and physical custody of both kids who are now teens. He started a new job last month as a substitute school bus driver. I am paying him $1300 a month child support. My rent is $1200 a month so my kids can have their own rooms. My health is going down hill. I have Reynaud's syndrome, Reactive Airway disease, eczema that reacts to any and all soaps (I am a NURSE), nerve damage from a fall in my left arm and a ripped rotator in my right shoulder. I am working full time at one job, and part time at the second plus trying to sort everything around custody. I'm exhausted. I hurt. And now the company I work for just cut my pay $6.00 an hour. All other home care agencies are paying less. I'm highly skilled. I did work dialysis but the chemical exposure and the soaps tore into my health and had me hospitalized twice! With MRSA. So...here I sit. He's still getting his child support at $1300 a month. I don't have the money to go back to court and fight this. I was treated like a criminal for supporting my family while my ex-husband slacked, and I got told that even if my wages are lower than the child support--even on unemployment I still have to pay that $1300 a month or face jail!!! This is an outrage! I've been working steady and paying this without complaint since 2007 with no reprieve while he still sits on his butt. He has bought 2 i-phone 4 per kid (he has 2 more now by the way!), spent $10k on a wedding in 2010, has a new vehicle, etc. The money is not being spent wisely and there is no system to monitor what the recipient of child support receives!! There is no break to the payor if they end up in the hospital for any length of time. The payor has no reprieve. This is unfair and needs to be fixed! Please start watching where this child support income goes, and give us a break if we suffer health related issues or job loss.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 20th, 2013Someone from El Paso, TX writes:
California's child support laws are unfair. I am a loving father that would love to do as much for my children as I can. My dream is to own a home, have the means to help all my children including step children through college. I want to be able to be there for them as much as I can. Since my child support payment was so high, and my arrears was accumulating I decided to re -join the us army. I was able to get promoted to hopefully work on my arrears balance but it never decreases but increases, in turn so does the child support. When I started I paid 900.00 month for three children and about 120.00 on an separate child case. My arrears was about 78,000 then and the other was about 8,000. Now in 2013 I tried to get a modification on my own it increased to 2020.00 monthly and the other case to 900.00. At this time I am lucky I am able to get housing as an army soldier with my wife, but once I retire in 11 months with 20 years in that will all end. My arrears as of now with the tax returns for every year is withheld and any saving above 3500.00 is garnished is for the first case 129,539.00 and the second12,000.00. How does California expect me to pay that all off, at times I've wondered if I would have been better off to lose my life in combat over seas so my life insurance would pay off what California and my x's expect I pay. How am I ever expected to pay all this with what I have to survive. I refuse to bea dead beat dad, I still pay for Christmas gift, visitation trips, since I was stationed in a different state, lawyer fees because I constantly have to fight the other parent for visitation rights as soon as a bug crawls up and makes them mad at me, doctor expenses, glasses, braces, wants and needs I never say no too. What is a loving father to do in a state that is against him. I made the mistake to pay the first cases parent direct instead of the child support agency not realizing is was not documented thus the arrears. Plus, she used fraud to get help from the state for medical and welfare. Thus more of my arrears balance. Is there light at the end of the tunel? Are there answers or help?REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 20th, 2013Someone from Hazel Green, AL writes:
I know too many women who do this and never have to work; mostly they live off of Medicaid.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 20th, 2013Someone from Lyndeborough, NH writes:
my child support obligation just increased to 430.00 per week and the master at the meeting could care less that me ex dose not file income taxes on 16000 dollars worth of house cleaning 2012 and shows no housecleaning income for 2011 even though she has been cleaning houses for yrs. She only files taxes on 9500 of oncome she couldn't hide. She also did not claim 25,000 she underpaid her last partner in buying out interest in the house, got the woman to sign the quitclaim deed then shorted her the money, all in all this brings her inclome to up over 50000 last yr but she only filed for under ten grand, now i am paying child support based on 25000 more than my base pay, and this is for shared custody.....all I can say is NH wants more deadbeat dads around ...why else would we be getting screwed like we areREPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 20th, 2013Someone from Bay Shore, NY writes:
I'm a retired police officer on disability. I was in the military, worked for the Dept of Corrections & was hurt in an accident after 16 years of service. Always followed the law, worked hard and supported my family. I'm divorced and have been the custodial parent of 3 children for 7 years. I receive no child support nor do I ask for it. I also have a 4th son. He's 3. I AGREED to give his mother SLIGHTLY more time ( in the evenings when my son is ready for bed) to his mother so she could enjoy extra time with him because she worked. Yes, I said WORKED not WORKS. She is a chiropractor with no other dependents, no property or home and the only debt she has is a car & credit cards. She voluntarily reduced her work hours, took me back to court, has hired 5 different attorneys & now I'm paying her child support PLUS arrears. The NYS child support collection unit has told me they're suspending my license even though I am paying. I also have my son a MINIMUM of 10 hours per day and 5 overnights bi weekly. These unfair & unjust, unconstitutional child support laws MUST be changed. They are destroying families & forcing good fathers out of their children's lives. I have strong bond with my children. My youngest son loves his dad and I'm unable to give him the quality of life he deserves because his mother is allowed to collect money from ME, reduce her hours at work ( even though she is capable of working) and is disguising MAINTENANCE as "child support." I never thought I'd be told I'm going to prison for being unable to pay a DEBT that the gov't has imposed on me. I have provided my children with EVERYTHING including his furniture at BOTH homes. Yet his mother continues to reap the benefits of this unconstitutional "child support" system which my son does not see a dime of.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 20th, 2013Someone from Galesburg, IL signed.
Jan 19th, 2013Someone from Davenport, IA signed.
Jan 19th, 2013Someone from Grandview, TX writes:
My two children's father has custody. I pay $800 each month. Last year my ex took me to court (one year to the day after the divorce) and got support raised. Our house was paid for when he and I divorced and I agreed to let him live in the house with the kids so as not to have to sell the house and move and disrupt the kids lives anymore. I also let him keep the nicer newer paid for car. When the youngest turns 18 he will have to pay me for half of the house. I had to work more hours last year to be able to pay more child support. Now this year AGAIN he is taking me back to court for more child support. Because I worked more to pay more support last year they will look at my income and raise it again! This will never end! How am I supposed to support myself (with a house and car payment) and continue to pay more child support every year. This is so unfair, the judge doesn't care, they just look at the income and increase support. It doesn't matter that my ex has an additional business, pays no rent, no car payments and to top it off he wants me to pay for their medical insurance too which he agreed to do and is set in the divorce papers that he is to be responsible for. Child support needs to be more fair for both parents. My kids do not need $1,600 a month for their expenses, which is what they are assuming it costs if my half is $800/ month. Laws need to be changed so that the expenses for the children are calculated and it is more equal for each parent!REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 19th, 2013Someone from Grandview, TX signed.
Jan 19th, 2013Someone from Buffalo, NY writes:
Cant find a job just recently got laid off with a severance and now the New york child support collection unit is collecting twice from my severance and unemploymentREPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 19th, 2013Someone from Newport, MI signed.
Jan 18th, 2013Someone from Carthage, NY writes:
i was just put in the rears for child support and i have never ever been late even though there wasn't a court order established for new york yet how is that possible? most woman now a days want a free ride even though deep down they are 10 times more crooked and corrupt than most men. i'm getting tired of doing the right thing or what i feel is the right thing and then getting back stabbed by the way that state laws are written. why do the right thing if this is happening. on top of i have my kids most vacations and at least half of the summer if not all and i have never seen one red cent from my ex because she told me that she feels that she don't have to financially help with my kids when they are with me not to mention she stole them from me when i was in a third world country so i have to pay to see them. do woman like that realize that it hurts the kids emotionally? my son wants to live with me and she refuses because with her she's all about the money and that's what it is. there should be one guideline on child support for all states that way you don't have to go through nine different courts if you have to move a lot. i am taking my case to the supreme court and fighting tooth and nail for what's right. not just for me but for others in the same position that i am in. be advise that there is much more to my story A LOT MORE!.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 18th, 2013Someone from Spokane, WA writes:
In Washington, they can take 50% of your paycheck to pay for back support. My husband's child support on his oldest was set ridiculously high, $600 a month and they wouldn't modify it for a long time. Then he was unemployed for a few years, so he basically has never in his entire life received more than 50% of his paycheck due to paying the back support. This puts him in a position of having to live off of someone in order to survive, and it's the only life he knows. We have now gotten that reduced to a more reasonable rate, and the oldest is now 17 anyway. He has another teenager that he pays reasonable child support on, and he has custody of one that we occasionally recieve some support from her (mostly) deadbeat mother. We also have two kids of our own. So, with 5 kids total, 50% of his paycheck goes toward back support on his oldest child who's mother and stepfather have historically made good money. We can't claim it on taxes, they don't declare it on taxes, and for the purpose of applying for any help they count it as OUR income. Any money he brings home ALMOST pays for daycare. Right now, he isn't working again, and I almost don't blame him, it's not like we ever see any of the money he earns.REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 18th, 2013Someone from San Antonio, TX signed.
Jan 18th, 2013Someone from East Orange, NJ signed.
Jan 18th, 2013Someone from Spokane, WA writes:
I'm Disbaled And unable to work But they want to lock me up and waste $3,400 just to collect $100..REPORT COMMENTS
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No, CancelJan 18th, 2013Someone from Orlando, FL signed.
Jan 18th, 2013Someone from Houston, TX signed.
Jan 18th, 2013Someone from Greenbush, ME writes:
I am a disabled individual who is trying to go for disability. I have a cap on what I can make until Social Security makes a decision if I am approved or not. Based on my earnings, I make $134.00 after taxes per week. For my ex wife, I am court ordered to pay $100.00 per week. $30.00 of that money every week has to go towards gas to get to work and pick him up every week 60 miles from where I live. That leaves me with about $16.00 a month to live off from. I am at my witts end and have been considering suicide because my 2 year old son who is getting $400 a month is doing fine, my fiance I am with now and my newborn baby have to go destitute because I have nothing. I have tried to modify child support but due to the fact I cannot afford an attorney, my obligation towards paying child support hasn't changed much. My ex wife hardly works at all and she sends our son to a day care full time which I have to pay for. I tried to demand that was unnecessary to the court but she claimed it is so she can maintain a full time slot. Oh well, I guess to my ex wife, our son without a father because I will be dead will be less important than daycare so she can sit at home all day and do nothing.REPORT COMMENTS
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