Despite what many custodial parents think, I do believe there are many benefits to the government being involved in the collection of child support and the enforcement of child support obligations. Most single parents cannot afford to support their children on their own without the help of the non custodial parent. The non custodial parent helped to make that child and should be responsible for helping to raise the child, both financially and emotionally. Custodial parents should almost always get the government involved in the collection of their support for many reasons.
First, you need a system to be involved to keep an official record of what is owed versus what has been paid. Trying to keep up with this on your own can be very cumbersome and forms a great burden when trying to prove in court what has been paid toward the child support obligation.
Second, even though case workers are extremely overworked and the work load is much more than one person can bare, the system works on it’s own every night to try to track the non custodial party and garnish their wages, bank accounts, and assets to fulfill the support obligation. So even when your caseworker is struggling to find time to work on your case, the system is still working for you to collect.
Third, government agencies are more successful in collecting support than a parent who is going at it on their own with lawyers, private detectives, etc. Also, if your children are receiving government assistance, the child support agencies will work for you for free in many states.
Children are already suffering because they’ve lost one of their parents and their family has broken up. They at least need the support required to keep food in their bellies, clothes on their backs, the electricity on, and hopefully they’ll have the luxury of being able to participate in extra curricular activities which will help to enrich their lives.
In conclusion, unless you have a really good relationship with the non custodial parent and are able to collect the support without agencies, lawyers, detectives, and judges, going with a government agency for the enforcement of your support order has many more benefits than downfalls.