The ranks of virtually all professions, no matter how profitable, include "deadbeat" parents: non-custodial mothers and fathers who are delinquent in their child-support payments. Indeed, even venture capitalists, engineers, software consultants, and doctors are behind in child-support payments and have racked up significant child-support debts.

Consider, for example, Jeffrey Nichols, who earned a reputation as the nation's worst "deadbeat dad" by accumulating an unpaid child-support tab topping $600,000. Though he worked as a precious metals consultant and owned costly possessions (including a $5,000 gold watch, a $500,000 house, and a new Mercedes), he ignored numerous court orders requiring him to pay child support. Like many other delinquent, non-custodial parents, Nichols eluded the authorities for years by moving frequently. But, his ex-wife didn't give up. She chased Nichols for six years through two countries and four states, until he was finally arrested in 1995. This case, then the biggest prosecuted under the Child Support and Recovery Act, was finally closed in November 1996 when Nichols was sentenced in New York to six months in prison for crossing state lines to avoid paying child support. He was ordered to pay the money he owed.

There's also a footnote in the Nichols case. In March 2000, Jeffrey Nichols was sentenced in Federal court to a year in prison, two years probation, and 200 hours community service for tax fraud, successfully prosecuted based, in part, on records uncovered during the child-support investigation.