My mom married my dad (a doctor) and quit her job (as a nurse) to raise my brother and I. She and my dad are still together, but if they had divorced, she would clearly have been entitled to alimony for all of the years that she spent taking care of our family rather than building a lucrative career for herself.

My husband married a lawyer (me) and quit his job (as an insurance adjuster) to raise our daughter and our autistic son. He and I are still together, but if we divorced, wouldn't he be equally entitled to alimony for all of the years that he has spent taking care of our family instead of building a lucrative career for himself?

Just askin'?

absolutely...men should revel in it absolutely 100% guilt free until more women feel like you do. Smart/handsome but lazy young men, in fact, should seek out a living this way. I am completely certain, that the laws will very quickly change as women finally see the logic of what men have been saying all along.

The article also mentions that the woman makes more than the man in 33% of couples. The ladies point this out without a moments reflection regarding their previous posts and their continual contention that women still earn less than men etc. etc. etc.

So, you're suggesting that my smart/handsome husband is lazy? What do you think he does all day? He is the least lazy person I know, and an argument can be made that, in every way except financially, he contributes more to my family than I do.

How did you manage to conclude I was saying anything about your husband?

I'm simply saying that, while there are certainly many, many women who absolutely deserve alimony for the sacrifices they make, there are also a number of women who take disgusting advantage of the system. A certain one-legged woman comes to mind as a recent example.

Your husband is clearly the male equivalent of the hard-working ladies, and would deserve alimony as I agreed. Whether he deserves to live in the lifestyle to which he has become accustomed is another matter; not one we were discussing.

Perhaps you cannot appreciate the rich irony of successful women spitting on the alimony checks they send to their ex-husbands. I think it's fantastic. Maybe it's a guy thing. By-the-way I'm happily married and never divorced so no jumping to conclusions please.

Emmajane:

My husband married a lawyer (me) and quit his job (as an insurance adjuster) to raise our daughter and our autistic son. He and I are still together, but if we divorced, wouldn't he be equally entitled to alimony for all of the years that he has spent taking care of our family instead of building a lucrative career for himself?

Just askin'?

In VA, if you had a marriage of long standing, (usually defined as of 7 years or more) your husband would be entitled to child and spousal support if you two divorced and he remained the primary custodian of your daughter and son. Even if you had no children and he'd worked to help support you through law school, he'd be entitled to some portion of your future earnings as a lawyer because he'd sacrificed during the marriage. We're very progressive in the Old Dominion.

Advn

I think that's true everywhere isn't it? I think the issue was that the XX bloggers were seemingly dizzy at the very idea that the husbands of successful women would be entitled to what they would automatically expect in the reverse.

The law is set-up in favor of the "poorer" spouse. This has been overwhelmingly to the benefit of women, and was shaped by the feminist movement - partially by false research conducted by a woman and published in the 80s.

Despite the one-sided benefit up to now, I think the language is gender neutral, and thus any husband in Emmajane's husband's position stands to receive what a woman would receive.

That's right isn't it? Maybe things are worse than I thought, and the law is written only for women.

Ummm... that would be unconstitutional and wrong (to write the laws only for one sex and not the other). Don't worry.

However, it's not false that the majority of people left worse off by divorce are women. Heck, married women couldn't even own property in their own names w/o an act of legislature; in VA, that didn't happen until 1920. At common law, man and wife are presumed to be one person and that person is the husband. (Blackstone says, "The very being and legal existence of woman is suspended during marriage, - incorporated or consolidated into that of her husband, under whose protection and cover she performs every thing.")

It's just not true that there was only one badly researched article by a woman back in the 1980s; I know there was a big Michigan Law Review piece on this by a guy in the 1990s and that the body of scholarship has continued to grow. It has informed bankruptcy law, child support and elder law.

Judges haven't awarded men as much spousal support, it's true, because most men make more than the women they're divorcing. Few men seek it. I had a friend with whom I used to work who wanted to be a public interest lawyer. Her husband was supportive of this throughout her law school education. He was a musician. However, when the marriage went south and he was no longer going to have someone to buy him studio time, he sued for spousal support based on her future income as a *corporate* attorney and argued that she was "voluntarily underemployed" working for the non-profit organization that was her heart.

I think you have to remember to look at things in their historical contexts. If women have been awarded more spousal support by the courts, it's been because the judges have said "this is what she needs financially to maintain the standard of living they had during the marriage. He can go out and make more money; she has foregone opportunities on behalf of the marriage." Remember that all these financial statements are verified and cross-examined by court and counsel for both sides, and sometimes by forensic accountants. As people's earning power equalizes, I think you'll see spousal support awarded less frequently.

Advn

I have no problem admitting that historically there have been inequities. You are not a whiner, but if the women who I see and read whining would admit their complaints are historic I'd be fine.

I think spousal support laws will change as soon as it isn't just men who are paying.

Advn2rgirl:

...If women have been awarded more spousal support by the courts, it's been because the judges have said "this is what she needs financially to maintain the standard of living they had during the marriage...

This is the part that, uh, confuses me a bit. I mean, a divorce is LIFE CHANGING. So why should the standard of living remain the same for the spouse not making the money? It's sort of like, um, STILL being married--but without all that nasty, interpersonal bother!

[However, I DO understand and support the notion of equal division of assets after a long marriage, during which the assets were created]

I think kuruman is right (have you ever diagnosed a case of kuru?), after enough instances of WOMEN paying through the nose to a flown-the-coop spouse, the law will magically change.

There's no reason men shouldn't get alimony for the same reasons that women get alimony. I'm sure that no one, no one, likes to pay money to a spouse who's no longer wanted. But fair's fair.

no, but I have diagnosed CJD, which is the same thing as you know...very scary stuff.

kuruman:

no, but I have diagnosed CJD, which is the same thing as you know...very scary stuff.

Hmmm, I had to stop and think for a second, and then I realized "Oh yeah, you probably don't examine the tissues of too many people who eat brains!"

DeaH:

There's no reason men shouldn't get alimony for the same reasons that women get alimony. I'm sure that no one, no one, likes to pay money to a spouse who's no longer wanted. But fair's fair.

But DeaH, I was trying to make the point that I see no direct logical reason that "fairness" is served by people automatically maintaining the same lifestyle after a divorce. Certainly, being divorced is a DIFFERENT lifestyle than being married--why does financial status have to remain the same?

Spouses are meant to support one another when MARRIED--that's what being married MEANS. So, it would seem that, by becomming UNmarried, that one would UNDO the process of support. Of course, it's made even MORE unfair because, NON MONETARY methods of support do NOT continue through divorce--only financial support continues, and in only one direction. Is that fair?

I don't know what "fair" means in a divorce--except perhaps fairly dividing assets acquired during the marriage or, of course, fairly dividing time with kids.

One person paying the other AFTER a divorce doesn't seem "fair." It seems like a gift for one and a punishment for the other.

IANAL, but last I checked alimony wasn't about the number of years one partner took off, but rather rehabilitory or supportive (i.e. now the person has been out of the field for x years it is hard to enter it again and hence there is some compensation due to help with this process-- education etc).

Also, of course men can get alimony.

One of the more interesting cases is that in New York, it is possible to get awarded life-long alimony during annulment proceedings (when one seeks an annulment on the basis of insanity).

No, the marriage wasn't valid from the start but now you are stuck supporting the other person for the rest of his.her life! Just goes to show religious influence in the law (if it weren't for Catholic demands, it would be called "divorce" instead).