Guy #1 calculates the payment per month. Guy #2 tries to "correct" him by calculating the payment per year. Guy #1 suggests that Guy #2 divide his answer by 12.
Right, but the $50k figure mentioned is a yearly salary, not a monthly income. If you paid $4,500 a month on a $50,000 salary, you would pay $54,000 in child support per year, which is more than your total income.
I think the deal is that most people can judge an annual salary than a monthly one, so he's trying to give a comparison of what the same percentage would be a month for someone with a more modest income. Guy #2 just didn't notice that.
I think the deal is that he's trying to stir shit by trying to tell people to "just relax", which is an easy way to keep people who are agitated from relaxing.
Not really, the article mentions the monthly amount, so they compared it to a monthly amount from someone who makes less money per year. A yearly salary is what most people in the work force in the US are used to talking about when referencing income, which is why they used that instead of monthly income. It also contrasts the dramatic difference in income between the average worker and someone who makes many times more in a single month than the average person does in an entire year.
In an in-depth critical analysis, sure, not a pithy tweet.
I can accept that it wasn't an intentional attempt at driving clicks through casual misinterpretation, though unlikely. But it's not an effective way to convey information to swap scales when trying to make comparisons. If you wanted to make that kind of comparison, you'd do it separately. At least if you were trying to convey a cogent point.