Child support?

When I got divorced in 1997, I was making $1000 every two weeks. I lost $280 in taxes, leaving me $720 every two weeks. Following the state law formula, the court ordered that I pay $348 to my ex wife, nominally for child support, leaving me with $720 per month to live on. The support was taken from my check before I even saw it, so I wouldn't be a 'deadbeat dad.' The rent on my apartment was $600 for a small one bedroom. I was soon homeless and without a car, moving from couch to couch at the homes of friends. I got a second job, picking up garbage after the Shamu show at Sea World. I got an apartment with three roommates. I bought a car at a "buy here, pay here." Somehow, I made it.

How was my wife making it? She didn't have a job. She had $696 per month in child support, $400 worth of food stamps, $300 in earned income credit, $200 per month in WIC, and $300 worth of welfare, plus she was getting $750 a month babysitting two children while their parents were at work. She netted a total of $2646 a month.

I always knew that my 'child support' was going to support their mother, not the kids. That is why things like this always make me angry, when I think about how women use their children to ride the gravy train, while their fathers get accused of being 'deadbeat dads' because they can't afford to pay.

To prove that the children were just a gravy train for her, when they were 16, she threw them out of the house and had them live with me. First my son, and a year later, my daughter. As soon as it was no longer profitable, they were unceremoniously thrown out. She still plays the game to get your tax dollars. Right after the first kid was thrown out, she got  a job at WalMart as a cashier, and 'injured' her back soon thereafter. She now collects Social Security Disability, along with WIC, welfare, and food stamps with the child that she had with her new husband.