Child Support and Self-Employment Income in Florida
When both parents receive a regular paycheck, calculating income for support purposes is usually straightforward. When one parent is self-employed or owns a business, it’s a genuinely harder problem — and the rules for figuring out “income” aren’t the same as the rules for filing taxes.
The Starting Formula: Gross Receipts Minus Ordinary and Necessary Business Expenses
For a self-employed parent, business owner, or independent contractor, Florida’s child support framework defines income as what the business brings in, minus the expenses actually required to produce that income.
This Is Narrower Than What the IRS Allows
A business expense can be a completely legitimate tax deduction and still not count as a reduction for child-support purposes. Discretionary expenses, or expenses that provide a personal benefit alongside a business one — a vehicle, a phone, travel — get closer scrutiny in a support calculation, and the parent claiming the deduction generally has to justify that it’s genuinely ordinary and necessary.
Retained Earnings Can Still Count as Income
If a parent leaves profits in a business rather than taking them as a distribution, a court can still include those retained earnings as income if there’s no legitimate business reason for holding them back.
Underemployment Can Result in Imputed Income
If a parent appears to be earning significantly less than their skills and history would support, a court can impute a higher income figure than what’s actually reported.
What This Means for Mediation
Support conversations involving self-employment income go better with real financial documentation on the table — tax returns, profit-and-loss statements, business bank records.
This article is general information, not legal, tax, or accounting advice. Sun State Mediator does not calculate income or determine what expenses qualify.
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