The Truth About Child Support
It’s NOT for children. It’s a welfare recovery system that puts a price tag on a child’s head. It promotes conflict, NOT co-parenting.
Child Support Does NOT Benefit Children
The child support system has never been, and is not today, about children; it’s about money. The federal government wanted to offset the cost of supporting low-income single mothers and, in its brilliance, thought it could recover that expense from low-income fathers. It is fundamentally racist and creates a financial incentive to pit parents against one another, which pushes a parent- usually the dad- away. It promotes conflict over parental cooperation, which directly conflicts with the child’s best interests. Established as Title IV-D of the Social Security Act, no single government program has caused greater harm to children. Child support is the main contributing factor to fatherlessness.
The Core Problem: Promotes Conflict Over Cooperation
The child support system is BAD for children because it was never designed with their best interests in mind. The government established it for two reasons: as a welfare recovery system and because it didn’t trust low-income parents, typically parents of color, to be good parents. Didn’t trust fathers to provide for their kids and in mothers being able to support them without the help of a man or government. By placing a price tag on a child’s head, child support gives emotionally, mentally unstable, or narcissistic parents a reason to fight for custody. It prioritizes a parent’s self-interest over the child’s best interests. Think about the divorced parents who successfully co-parent and have happy, healthy children. They don’t want anything to do with child support.
Repeal Title IV-D of the Social Security Act!
One of the many myths about child support is that it’s for kids; it’s NOT. Established as an enforcement system, part of the draw to suck mothers in was the promise of holding dads accountable. If they didn’t or couldn’t pay, the system would suspend their drivers and professional licenses and throw them in jail until they paid. So effing stupid. Besides the obvious, the biggest problem with this logic is that it sets families up for failure and has moms digging a deeper hole for themselves and their children.
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Love & Support Your Children – Don’t Pay or Accept Child Support
Almost every parent wants to provide for their child to the best of their ability. However, nobody wants to support their ex through child support. Think of the parents who had an amicable divorce and whose kids are happy, healthy, and well-adjusted. Most likely, instead of paying child support, they share child-specific expenses (school, clothes, camp, etc.) and support their child (allowance, savings, car, etc.) as they see fit. Rather than arguing about overnights, they help each other out. Like their kids, they are happier and better off by waiving child support.
HERO or Victim? Who Do You Choose To Be?
Most parents figure out parenting plans and determine how they will each financially support their children because they have the right mindset. Despite any friction between the parents, they understand that their kids will be much better off when they work together to co-parent and provide. The top priority for these parents is to foster a peaceful co-parenting relationship where their children can flourish with healthy, loving connections with both mom and dad. Each parent has chosen their mindset; they decided to have the mindset of a Hero, not a victim. It’s your choice: which will you choose?
Peace or Conflict?
The choice is truly that simple for parents considering their future. When it comes to custody, the first decision parents should make is to separate the issues of time and money. SplitSmart.com is an innovative solution that makes separating custody and support easy. Instead of paying support, it’s a process of sharing child-specific expenses. Because when it’s for your child, this eliminates most of the financially based conflict. Next, each parent list how he or she wants to or can support their child beyond expenses. Whether it’s allowance, college savings, or anything else, all of that can really add up. Because it’s not about yourself or the other, the focus remains on your children, avoiding most conflict.
Child-Centered Parenting Plans
Granted, far too many parents choose to play the victim instead of the hero, but that’s the problem SplitSmart.com was specifically designed to solve. Our innovative line-item negotiation approach is based on three beliefs: no one thinks they are a “bad actor, ” bad actors don’t want their written word to betray them, and a written position softens a verbal stance. For hero parents, it’s incredibly easy and quick to create a mutually supportive, child-centered parenting plan. It will take longer for those with a victim mentality, but if mediators and courts do their jobs, selfish motivations will be exposed, and they will eventually come around to the fact that cooperation and co-parenting are a hell of a lot easier than conflict and playing the victim.
System Solution
Extracurricular Support Program (ESP): Reward cooperation, not conflict.
ESP incentivizes low-income parents to collaborate rather than enter the child support system. When parents work together, children thrive—and families become more stable and resilient. ESP shifts the system’s focus from punishment to partnership.
The program pays for or subsidizes extracurricular and after-school activities like sports, clubs, or enrichment programs—not childcare. Both parents must agree on their child’s participation, encouraging teamwork and shared involvement.
To qualify, parents must reach court-approved co-parenting and financial agreements that keep both engaged and avoid opening a formal child support case. Parents with existing cases may also qualify by closing the case and forgiving any support debt.
Continued participation requires both parents to approve each ESP-funded activity and regularly confirm that:
- They remain equally involved,
- Neither is undermining the child’s relationship with the other,
- No active investigations or allegations of abuse or domestic violence exist.
ESP supports families who choose cooperation over conflict—and puts kids at the center of healthier parental relationships.
Resources for Those Dealing with Child Support
Like a healthy marriage or divorce, it takes two. It only takes one to make life harder for the whole family by demanding child support.
A dad who won his child custody case and became his son's primary custodial parent, going public on the strategies he used and what he learned along the way so you can get up to speed quickly.
Our mission is to prepare and guide 100,000 fathers to reunite with their children and strengthen their connection through a counterintuitive path - not through force or family courts.
