What happens is the mother doesn’t list anybody on the birth certificate and the father has some day job. The mother collects full benefits and so long as dad’s working, the family lives pretty well. Including new cars. It’s unbelievable, but it happens all the time. There really ought to be negative repercussions for not declaring a father on the birth certificate. And then the father and mothers’ incomes both need to be figured before granting food stamps. It’s a huge abuse of the system and it’s happening more and more.
And that is the way it is done. They will even list the dad or any other man they are living with on their quarterly income reports as roommates. I worked for the welfare dept many many years ago. Almost every single mom had a male ‘roommate’.