I have brought this up before. For 4 years I was a single parent. My ex is a master at avoiding paying child support*. I had a full-time, decently paying job (1999 dollars, anyway). And I couldn’t afford the childcare. I literally could not afford to work, eat, and pay rent. My commute was an hour each way because the city I worked in was WAAAY too expensive so I lived in a cheaper city, so it would have been far easier to quit my job, stay home with my kid, and collect welfare.
Fortunately, I got a subsidy to pay my childcare expenses. That’s right, I still had to go on public assistance just to keep my job.
(*I say “is” because our child is now 20 years old and he still owes $30,000 in back support.)
