patrick.net

turtledove says

My husband has paid three-quarter's of a million dollars in court-ordered child support for two kids over the last twelve years. When the oldest started college two years ago, she told him there was no money.

We could make child support based on reimbursements, rather than a set fee the woman has total control of.

"$300 for hair coloring at Wonder Day Spa? Janet is only 9 years old!"
"That was me. My new boyfriend and I---."
"I'm not paying for that. This is child support, not adult support."

vs.

"$300 for hair coloring at Wonder Day Spa?"
"Janet's Prom, she's 17 you know"
"*SIGH* Fine."

clambo says

Turtledove's story is amazing.

You realize that I am NOT the ex-wife, right? If I had received the money she had, I'm pretty sure I'd have two dimes to rub together to contribute to my child's education.

clambo says

Did he pay for your "premium" Patrick account or did you?

I know, I know. $5/month... I'm like a princess!

turtledove says

So why aren't you guys fighting harder? Women would be.

We don't like to whine (except anonymously online).

We should recruit deprived second wives to do it for us.

SoftShell says

The story loses it's 'funnyness' when you realize the guy is just porking a piece of meat, no love involved.

A sad legacy of the now 45 year old sexual revolution.

thunderlips11 says

We could make child support based on reimbursements, rather than a set fee the woman has total control of.

We tried so hard to include expense accounting in the new law. I think the issue is the practicality of having to treat each and every child support case as a unique situation. With standard rates, you simplify the cases a bit. Even though the amounts were reduced, you still had padding. For example, 7% of the GA support amount was for activities. This gets back to needs v. wants. Activities for children shouldn't be a part of the c/s calculation. It's just not a need. Do we force parents in intact marriages to pay a set amount for activities? Of course not. But when it comes to c/s, there is a portion that is allotted for such things.... whether the custodial parent chooses to spend it on activities for the kids, or not.

Enjoy your watermelon.

P N Dr Lo R says

SoftShell says

The story loses it's 'funnyness' when you realize the guy is just porking a piece of meat, no love involved.

A sad legacy of the now 45 year old sexual revolution.

All I can say is that I am fortunate to have met my wife back when I was in college back in my early 20s. The things I hear about the dating scene from the people in their 30s and 40s are sickening to say the least. It's like gangsta rap - "watch your back or u might get smoked!"

dublin hillz says

All I can say is that I am fortunate to have met my wife back when I was in college back in my early 20s. The things I hear about the dating scene from the people in their 30s and 40s are sickening to say the least. It's like gangsta rap - "watch your back or u might get smoked!"

Better to get smoked, than burnt,,,nigga!

If a woman pulls this stunt, and the man reacts with a swift kick to her uterus, destroying the fetus, could he claim financial self defense

dublin hillz says

It's like gangsta rap - "watch your back or u might get smoked!"

I heard at that point, people are searching for a "Nurse with a Purse"

ah, your fallacy there is the assumption that women are turned on by stable and reliable companions. they are not. such men may be the best economic choice, but it's not just about economics.

Agreed. I was speaking in terms of what criteria women should use to select mates, not what they actually use.

The problem is that we're all still running Cromag v 1.0, which was fine in the Stone Age when there were no laws and dominate men would simply kill their sexual competition and take the women they want by force or not.

The thing is, we now live in the Information Age. And that changes what makes a good male mate, but not what makes a good female mate.

In the Stone Age, aggressive alpha males ruled. But today, they end up in prison. The ability to write a web service is far more valuable than the ability to run down an antelope. But women still have the same preferences as their Stone Age ancestors, but those preferences are bad today.

Men also want in a female mate what their Stone Age ancestors wanted, but these things are just as good today as they were back then. Men want women who are: young, fertile, faithful, and nurturing to children. All those things are as important now as they were in the Stone Age.

Heraclitusstudent says

Women are biologically wired to look for resourceful men.

I have no problem with that. That is a good instinct because children, even today, are expensive. They require lots of resources to raise.

But the instinct to look for a bad boy is highly counterproductive today.

And I agree that the family court system has become corrupt and anti-male, and I submit that this is the real reason heterosexual marriage rates have declined dramatically. It's not the gays; it's the divorce lawyers.

I always found smart, competent guys to be the most attractive. You have to be smart to be funny. And a razor sharp sense of humor is an extremely attractive quality in a man.

Dan8267 says

But the instinct to look for a bad boy is highly counterproductive today.

So you say: High Testosterone men still perform better on many tasks, including athletic but also some intellectual tasks:

http://www.livescience.com/7290-finger-length-predicts-sat-performance.html

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080414174855.htm

They are generally more effective leaders:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/laurie-erdman/hormones-the-hidden-leadership-tool-you-are-overlooking_b_3742660.html

They must have a better immune system to survive:
http://www.genengnews.com/gen-news-highlights/high-testosterone-men-have-the-weakest-immune-responses/81249287/

Of course they may be prone to cheating and so not as good fathers.

You can't blame women for liking them. Evolution is an on-going process.

Am I missing something? The average child support payment in this country is only $350/mo. Sucks for the idiot moms who get themselves pregnant by slackers, and more importantly pity the lives of their spawn. Legally mandated support for one child tops out around $2000/mo even if you make more than 10 times that amount. That's not a lot of money. I voluntarily pay my ex wife more than double the court mandate. If some pretty young thing wants to get pregnant in exchange for a $2k/mo tax free cash subsidy, send me your number, and let's talk.

am I missing something here? how can a woman "entrap" a man by buying a positive test? Wouldn't the man find out in a few months that she lied? When he does she and her false commitment that she extracted will be out with the trash...

My sister makes more money than her ex, and so she pays him support of like $1200 a month. That's for two kids, and she has 50% custody.
It does go both ways. She wasn't one of those ladies looking for a man with a good job, someone who can support himself and more. So she got a loser who she had to support. Took her a while to wise up, but her next husband makes more than I do.
Points:
1) don't marry a loser, male or female
2) child support is figured equally, and the least part of a parent's responsibility to their offspring .
3) alimony is criminal, I don't support that at all.

Sam1000 says

am I missing something here? how can a woman "entrap" a man by buying a positive test? Wouldn't the man find out in a few months that she lied?

Depends. For example, it could induce marriage. She could also have a fake miscarriage, which happens in a large number of pregnancies anyway. Also, maybe they stop using any sort of birth control because "she's already knocked up" so then she really does get pregnant and has a "late-arriving" baby.

The reality is that the type of women who do this are probably low income/low educated types who are also dating similar men. Think Jerry Springer stuff. They may not be able to afford a lot of prenatal care anyway, so it's not like they are going to 2-3 ultrasounds or anything before the kid is born.

The other option is that the man they are dating does have money, and they are just trying to extort money from the situation -- e.g. give me 20 grand to go away. Or give me $10K to have an abortion and deal with the trauma. Still done by gold digger trash, of course. The ruse isn't particularly sophisticated because the people engaging in it aren't particularly sophisticated.

Yes, the general rules should be:

1. If you can't afford to pay child support out of your after - tax income, don't screw around;

2. If state child support formula applied to the given prospect is inadequate for you to live as single parent, find a better prospect before putting out.

Fairly simple concepts for safety put options before plunging into the positions.

Reality says

Am I missing something? The average child support payment in this country is only $350/mo. Sucks for the idiot moms who get themselves pregnant by slackers, and more importantly pity the lives of their spawn. Legally mandated support for one child tops out around $2000/mo even if you make more than 10 times that amount. That's not a lot of money. I voluntarily pay my ex wife more than double the court mandate. If some pretty young thing wants to get pregnant in exchange for a $2k/mo tax free cash subsidy, send me your number, and let's talk.

Yes, you're missing a couple of things. First, child support varies from state to state. It is false to say that child support tops out at any particular number. Even if the tables only go so high, extraordinary income will also be factored in. For a man making $100k/year, paying $500/month for family health insurance, with two children and an ex-wife who doesn't work, selected states calculate as follows:

California: $2,112
Georgia: Between $1955 and $2380
Florida: $1737

Now let's see what happens when you make $200k/year:

California:$3275
Florida: $2664
Georgia: between $3841 and $4676

These calculations are from the alllaw calculator:

http://www.alllaw.com/calculators/childsupport

Extraordinary income which is typically anything above $250-300k depending on the state is handled at the discretion of the judge. In my experience, they aren't particularly kind.

Saying that the average child support payment is $350 is like saying the average house in the US costs $150k. It doesn't mean much.

The difference in numbers was due to my assumption of one child, and your calculation using two children. I presumed that a guy unwillingly made a father once by a woman (as in the con job illustrated in the title post) would not allow that to happen again with the same woman. Twin births are rare.

Reality says

The difference in numbers was due to my assumption of one child, and your calculation using two children.

Okay, we can assume one child, $100k/year income, and $500/month for family health insurance paid by non-custodial parent. You might be surprised to learn that the support amounts aren't half.

California: $1375
Florida: $1121
Georgia: between $1445 and $1955

Now, let's look at $200k/year in salary:

California: $2047
Florida: $1747
Georgia: between $2839 and $3841

The better a job you have the tougher it is when it comes to non-payment. You guys with good jobs are a Child Support Enforcement agent's favorite kind. For the dollars they collect, they can get federal matching funds... So they like to go after the guys with solid jobs because you are easy to find and your income is easily garnished.

Reality says

Hypothetical question: if your dear husband had an extramarital affair and produced a child, would you prefer paying that other woman $2000/mo to make them go away, or fight to have your husband be the custodial parent and probably you adopting the child yourself . . . Or take a really sharp knife and castrate the ducky? LOL. Assuming the third option is not available, I'd be curious about the answer from the both of you. I divorced my ex wife because I did not wish to potentially put her up to the dilemma while we were still married. So a divorce would free me up to pursue girls half my age, and her having flings with guys too.

I would appreciate the opportunity to fight for the right to have our household assume the care and custody of the minor child. No castration option would be considered!
I think most American women would divorce their husband under your hypo, though. So I admit that I am different than a lot of women this way.

turtledove says

The better a job you have the tougher it is when it comes to non-payment. You guys with good jobs are a Child Support Enforcement agent's favorite kind. For the dollars they collect, they can get federal matching funds... So they like to go after the guys with solid jobs because you are easy to find and your income is easily garnished.

That's generally true in the collections business. A collections agency is more likely to go after $300 from a doctor than $3000 from a guy who works at Starbucks.

turtledove says

We tried so hard to include expense accounting in the new law. I think the issue is the practicality of having to treat each and every child support case as a unique situation. With standard rates, you simplify the cases a bit. Even though the amounts were reduced, you still had padding. For example, 7% of the GA support amount was for activities.

I agree that this lack of expense accounting and the lack of individuality is rather lazy on the part of family courts. Child support should be treated as if it were a trust account for a child. If the money were in an actual trust, the trustee would be liable if the money was not used according to the terms of the trust, i.e. for the best interest of the child and for the basic needs of the child. The trustee, the custodial parent in this case, should be liable for any misspent funds and should have to account for all expenses spent on the child, just like they would if this were a trust fund.

The current system doesn't make sense, and it's because family courts are too lazy and incompetent to do it right.

Family law is run in the best interests of the lawyers. Plunder the marital estate and turn it into outlandish legal fees, make sure the divorce goes on forever to keep up the fee generator, get the parties to hate each other forever, and use the kids and the ex as a permanent boot lock on somebodies income.

i can see that it's fair to support your own biological progeny if it was your choice/irresponsibility to create them and they are provably yours.

the part of our law that really horrifies me is that men can be forced to pay child support for children their wives conceive while cheating on them.

corntrollio says

Child support should be treated as if it were a trust account for a child. If the money were in an actual trust, the trustee would be liable if the money was not used according to the terms of the trust, i.e. for the best interest of the child and for the basic needs of the child. The trustee, the custodial parent in this case, should be liable for any misspent funds and should have to account for all expenses spent on the child, just like they would if this were a trust fund.

Especially when they use specific expenses to justify additional dollars. In our case, she argued that she wanted to make sure that she had enough money so she could save for college. You would think that this would go nowhere, because it's a backdoor way of collecting post-majority support in a case where post-majority support was never court ordered. She got up on the stand and cried that she wasn't able to save for college. Of the three times she tried to get increases that was the only time her argument worked. You can imagine our genuine surprise when she tells her son, ten years later, that she doesn't have any money to give him for college. Oh the temptation to order a court transcript and give it to the son....

the part of our law that really horrifies me is that men can be forced to pay child support for children their wives conceive while cheating on them.

The presumption of paternity is horrifying. In my days of working on child support reform, I heard many horror stories, including guys who had paid for years, learned that they weren't the father and were still required to pay child support even though the child wasn't theirs. If the court decides it's in the child's best interest then you will continue to pay. Here I'm thinking you should be entitled to damages from the lying, cheating ex. Shows what I know.

corntrollio says

The reality is that the type of women who do this are probably low income/low educated types who are also dating similar men.

And the smart ones will target guys like you. You are educated, you have good jobs, most of you are reasonably decent people... I can see how a young woman with a tough situation could see you as her meal ticket. She buys a positive test, tells you she's pregnant, gets you to marry her quickly, suffers a "miscarriage," and then gets pregnant for real. She treats you well enough so you don't suspect that you were the victim of anything.

Of course, crazy is hard to hide for very long. Eventually you divorce, and she is set for a long time. Certainly she's in a much better situation than she was before she met you. And don't worry, she'll be lining up her next meal ticket as soon as possible. Because she now has some money to throw around, she should be able to marry-up the second time around.

turtledove says

I can see how a young woman with a tough situation could see you as her meal
ticket

You gotta wonder about the lack of thinking on the part of the dudes who are established that will get with chicks who are in a "tough situatiion." Social darwinism at work....

turtledove says

I can see how a young woman with a tough situation could see you as her meal ticket. She buys a positive test, tells you she's pregnant, gets you to marry her quickly, suffers a "miscarriage," and then gets pregnant for real. She treats you well enough so you don't suspect that you were the victim of anything.

Yes, this is why you have to verify things (again, see my anecdote of the resourceful nurse who managed to get a fake ultrasound), and why you should have more anal sex and less banal sex with women you don't trust.

Just as a practical matter, there's no reason to get married today just to have a kid with someone you don't know, and there's very little reason you can't wait a few months anyway. My old apartment building was right near a spot that was commonly used for wedding pictures, and you would see brides in all stages of pregnancy, including some that looked like their water might break during the photos. To be honest, some of them may have also gotten pregnant in that location in the first place.

If you are a lawmaker and you look at this problem, you realize a large part of young women are too silly to take their pills consistently, and as a result, children will be born in bad conditions.

So next you look at who is going to get stuck paying for this, and young (or not so young) men, innocent or not, are the perfect targets.

Crazy bitches are just unintended consequences.

thunderlips11 says

My guess is that middle class white guys don't see themselves as victims

And a sense of "duty" gets pounded into every boy's skull at an early age. Time to pay the piper, boy!

Speaking of Male Privilege...

thunderlips11 says

Speaking of Male Privilege...

Add to that rape victims: more men than women.
Yes, thanks to prisons, more men are raped in the US than women.

Obio says

Lesson for men: Buy a pregnancy test on the way home. Mark the stick in some
recognizable way. Get her to pee on it.

Also pick up a few Frappuccinos while you're in there. Pregnancy tests can be the strongest anti-diuretic in the world. Even after chugging 24oz of iced tea and driving nearly an hour to some obscure distant clinic of her choosing, she might not be able to produce a drop.

Before all this, pay attention to her cycle and use the moon as an ovulation guide. The most strident "Right now is safe- I know my body!!!" women tend to be full of shit.

This is based on experiences from my 20s. Come to think of it, now that I'm in my upper 40s, there are STILL female cohorts with very selective understanding of how reproduction works.

Automan Empire says

there are STILL female cohorts with very selective understanding of how reproduction works.

Can't be worse than what Republican males know about the female reproduction system.

Wow, a woman sparked one of the most misogynistic threads that I have ever read on Patnet. And I have read a few. Just sayin'.

The other problem with child support is that judges have been known to 'impute' income. For instance, if a judge figures that you should be making $100k, and you're unemployed, or you're working for a start-up only taking $25k/year cash salary -- they have no trouble calculating the support obligation as though the payor makes $100k/year.

In this economy, where a lot of people are involuntarily underemployed, especially in the tech sector, this is scary. Some judge might read one of the various nonsensical "shortage of tech workers" articles, and accept an argument by the baby momma's attorney that their inability to find a job is voluntary.

I personally know a few farmers/ranchers who have been caught up in this. Their child support or alimony obligations are calculated based on cashflow, which does not include long-term depreciation expenses. It effectively robs them of the ability to re-invest in, and make their business more efficient. Thus damaging their long-term ability to pay support. Of course this doesn't matter to some greedy ex-spouse who is just looking to extract the maximum amount of short-term cash possible.

lahossain says

Wow, a woman sparked one of the most misogynistic threads that I have ever read on Patnet. And I have read a few. Just sayin'.

Oh, please. Telling it like it is is not misoginy. It is just the truth.

However, supporting the current state of family law and the current practises of family courts is definitely misandric.