In 2011, 27 percent of the parents who were supposed to get child support lived below the poverty line. Of those, only 40 percent received full payment, while 27 percent received nothing at all. These are families who could really use the money. On average, poor parents who get child support rely on it for more than half of their annual income. If they are on welfare, though, parents are generally required to hand over the rights to their child support, which is used to pay the state back. This leads to a situation in which the other parent is writing child support checks, but the children see little to no additional money. The parent with the children can even be fined if he or she does not help locate the other parent.

And what about the parents who are not paying up? They are mostly poor, too. A study from 2004 noted that people making less than $10,000 a year, or with no reported income, accounted for 70 percent of the total child support debt owed, or $49 billion of the $70 billion owed nationwide. These parents seem unlikely to ever pay off their obligations, which, with interest and penalties, only grow over time.

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By fiscal year 2013, national child support debt had grown to $116 billion. The overhanging debt spawns obstacles for those trying to find work: Their cars might get slapped with a lien, or they might get jailed for nonpayment. Not working or being incarcerated means accumulating more debt — and so on.