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Is child support really helping needy families?
Filed under: Just For Moms, Just For Dads, Divorce & Custody, Sex
The holidays can be a very stressful time for most of us. It can be additionally stressful for people who are struggling to get by, worried about how they will continue to provide for their families, while also struggling to provide some semblance of a holiday celebration for their children.Single mothers seem to be hit the hardest. A lot of states publish statistics showing how they are actively and aggressively collecting past-due child support payments and tracking down "deadbeat dads." What they fail to tell you is that a lot of the time, they are also taking this money away from the children who need it.
In the United States, when a woman applies for welfare and she is currently not receiving child support, she must provide information regarding the child's biological father and sign an agreement that the state may pursue him for child support. It sounds like a beneficial program, because the mother receives additional monies for her children. By all appearances, a woman who is not currently receiving child support and who is forced to go on welfare to support her children will now be able to provide a better life for her children, right?
Wrong. What happens in these cases is that when the states finally do begin collecting child support, a large percentage of the payments are kept by the state, with only a small amount being forwarded to the mother. While the state may begin collecting child support from the father, the money collected is first used to repay the welfare debt of the mother. Therefore, the mother is thrown into an even worse financial situation. According to the state, she is receiving child support, but in reality, she is not receiving that money -- it is being kept by the state. Meanwhile, the state is including these cases in their statistics of women who are now receiving child support. Worst case scenario, it could even affect the amount of welfare a woman may qualify for, because child support payments are included in the numbers used to calculate the amount someone receives based on their income.
Therefore, statistics that show the number of cases where fathers have been tracked down by the state to pay child support are not reflecting the number of women who are not actually receiving the majority of these payments. Isn't the goal to keep women off welfare and encourage them to work towards supporting their families without federal assistance? Isn't it also a goal to ensure that fathers meet their financial obligations towards their children? The current system seems counterproductive to those goals. Of the nation's total uncollected child-support arrears of $105 billion in 2006, a University of Baltimore study shows that more than half was owed to the federal and state governments to recover welfare costs, rather than to families.
How can any government official feel like this is beneficial to the well-being of needy children?
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 1)
12-17-2007 @ 9:05AM
ashley said...i am in that exact situation now. the state finally got my ex(who lives in another state) to pay his child support. i figured i would be able to get off welfare (who gives me about $300 a month) and start receiving the child support (he has been ordered to pay close to $600 a month)
when i asked my caseworker about this, she said i would be lucky if i see $50 of what he's paying, because the state wants their money back. i have been on welfare for about 2 years now, my ex left when i was 5 months pregnant and already had a 8 month old. so since he's paying almost double what i get from the state, in order for that to go to me, i would have to go without any help for a little over a year until what the state has givin me is paid off. (except for the measly $50 i would get out of what he pays)
i truly can't afford to do that, so i am forced to stay on welfare, until who knows when. i hate it, but what else can i do?
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12-17-2007 @ 9:46AM
Ethel said...Man, what a horrible and stupid situation to put moms and children in!
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12-17-2007 @ 10:03AM
Lauren said...Well even when you go to court to just enforce child support, the courts don't keep up with it, they are supposed to issue bench warrants if the case has gone to court and whoever the non custodial parent is, hasn't paid support for however long, they still don't do anything if that person hasn't paid for over a month, I think it's a lot of uselessness is that a word? It's time and money taken away from everyone involved.
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12-17-2007 @ 11:17AM
michelle said...I have a friend that who is still having her child support payments "garnished" due to having been on welfare. The father owes over 10K and (if he keeps up on the payments of back and current support), she won't see the benefit of it for at least another year or 2. She's been off assistance since her child was 5 and he is not 14!
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12-17-2007 @ 3:02PM
LS said...Not to sound heartless, but stories like these show me - again - how wrong it is to rely on government for *anything*. Yes, I know these women are between a rock and a hard place, and they have my sympathy and prayers. But I have a hard time placing my faith in a government that cries poor, even while they have both hands in my pockets.
I hope that the women who find themselves needing to collect back child support can find good lawyers who will work with them on a pro-bono or pay-later basis, so they don't have to rely on the government's "help" any more than they have to. Because, honestly, with 'friends' like this, they certainly don't need any enemies.
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12-17-2007 @ 8:01PM
Meagan said...Does anyone know the actual reasoning behind this? Other than greed and stupidity? I wasn't aware that welfare could be looked at as a debt, and it sounds like that's what they're doing here. If they're claiming that the father owes a debt because the government has been covering his costs, and that he must pay his debt to the the government BEFORE he pays welfare that makes a bit more sense, although it still puts the people involved into an impossible cycle, but in that case they shouldn't be able to claim that the women are being paid welfare.
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12-18-2007 @ 1:15AM
BrokeMom said...Wait wait wait! I have insight on this. I work for a welfare office, and here is how it goes (in California, anyways)...when a custodial parent (not always mom, but we'll use it here because it is more common) gets on welfare, she is required to surrender her child support. She will get to keep $50.00 of it every month, which is not counted in her welfare budget. If her child support is more than her Cash Aid would be, she (if she's smart) keeps the child support, not going on welfare.
Say she's on welfare and her ex decides to start paying child support. Again, the state will take it all but $50.00 BUT if she knows he is a dependable guy and will pay the full amount on time blah blah, then she can stop the welfare and keep ALL of the child support EXCEPT for any past due amounts, which go to the state (for paying the support in the form of cash aid).
The state cannot keep current support if mom is not on aid, flat out, and mom always has the choice to keep child support OR welfare, but not both.
I hope this clarifies any misconceptions...
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12-18-2007 @ 7:27PM
trish said...Broke Mom,
Part of what you're saying is true. However, child support is paid to the state, which then distributes it to the mother. If the mother has already received welfare for an extended period of time, the state still takes the money to pay for the welfare payments she received IN THE PAST. It's not even considering the current payments. So, even if she stops receiving welfare, the state might still take her money because of her past welfare payments. That's how it works in Texas.
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