http://books.google.com/books?id=dRY1-7WFlTwC&dq=Page+40+of++The+Law+...

Page 40 of The Law and Economics of Child Support Payments By William S. Comanor addresses the phenomenon of the 'Deadbeat Dad'; starting with a welfare scenerio, showing that since dads pay money to the state, and AFDC pays the mother there simply is no incentives for fathers to pay support thru the system, because $1 paid to the state provides $0 benefit to the child, and only payments under the table directly to the mother or child have any real benefit to the child.

Many non custodial parents [NCP] argue that all parents have a responsibility to care for thier child, but that making these payments thru the state is the least responsible course of action, because the only real support a NCP gives a child is the time and money actually spent with, and directly on a child.

The book by Comanor explains Child Support Civil Disobedience for higher income levels thru an analysis of the difference between individual and collective consumption preferences. Child support payments raises the income of the custodial [CP] parent thus raising the individual consumption preference of that parent, so that only a portion of the Non Custodial Parent's child support payment is now allocated to the child. So, like in the welfare baby moma scenerio, the $1 dollar of NCP pays in support payment is no longer $1 going to the child, but rather a fraction gets apportioned to the child, with the remainder enhancing the consumption of the CP due. The NCP views 'under the table' and 'off the books' support payments as a dollar for dollar contribution to the child, while forced state child support schemes are viewed as contributing little or nothing to the child.

Often a CP must enroll a child in daycare, hire a babysitter or other activity after divorce, to replace the child caring role of the NCP previosly held in the marriage. In this scenerio litigations ensue to minimize NCP contact in order to maximize the child support payments to the CP, which do nothing to benefit the child. but simply transfer both the income and the role of the NCP to a third party, often against the wishes and preferences of the NCP. When a NCP shares in the care of a child, he may have preferences to care for the child say 50 hours a month, and spend say $500 a month on the child, and the child directly benefits $500 and quality parent involvment. When forced out of the family by the state, the $500 a month support payment paid by the NCP may only pay for the 50 hours of supervision at say $10/hr, and while the NCP 'out of pocket' expense is still $500, the child recieves $0 benefit from this transfer and both the chilld and NCP are denied other benefits of care and companionship.

In the case of a high conflict divorce at higher income levels, reasonable parents may conclude that $0 of thier child support payments does anything to support thier child, and it is just another name for payment directly to the corrupt court that is paid to remove the NCP from thier children. The Wall Street Journal published a recent study showing the average legal fees for divorce to be about $78,000. In other words a $500/month child support payment by the NCP to the CP would take 13 years to payoff typical legal fees needed to win the custody battle and resulting child support payment. Thus, $0 dollar benefiting the child compared to an alternative resolution without legal fees leaves that amount to benefit the child. Parents may simply view the forced orders for custody payments as Lawyer Support; and Lawyer Support Civil Disobedience has a much nicer ring to it. Corruption across Family courts could be easily measured by comparing data on legal fees, child support amounts, and allocation of parenting time... if the courts were not so corrupt and made this information readily available for analysis.