Nolo's Essential Guide to Divorce - Emily Doskow [125]
Negotiating Support With Your Spouse ......................................................................291
Evaluating Your Spouse's Resources .............................................................................291
Evaluating Your Needs .........................................................................................................293
Paying Spousal Support in a Lump Sum .....................................................................293
Payments to Third Parties ..................................................................................................294
Planning for Possible Disability or Death of the Supporting Spouse....... 295
Changing the Amount of Spousal Support Later ..................................................296
Tax Planning When You Pay or Receive Support ...................................................297
Basic Rules .................................................................................................................................. 297
If You Receive Support .........................................................................................................298
If You're Paying Support ......................................................................................................299
Keeping Health Insurance in Force .................................................................................300
Staying Insured Through Your Former Spouse With COBRA ........................301
Special Rules for Military Spouses .................................................................................303
f the many reasons that divorce is so stressful and difficult, making the money that's been supporting one household stretch to support two is high on the list. For women, in particular, concerns about making ends meet can cause a lot of anxiety. Despite the ever-increasing percentage of married women who work, women still earn about 77 cents for every dollar men earn, and most women suffer financially in divorce. The prospect of returning to paid work after time spent at home raising kids can also be a source of worry.
Spousal support, also called "alimony" or "maintenance," is designed to help a lower-earning spouse make it through the divorce and the transition into a new single life. (Rules about continuing health insurance coverage after divorce exist for the same reason.) Depending on the length of the marriage and the degree to which one spouse was financially dependent on the other, support can last for many years. However, the nationwide trend is for courts to award spousal support in fewer and fewer situations, and for shorter times when they do award it, because it's so common for both spouses to work or at least be able to return to work.
Whether one spouse is entitled to support from the other after the divorce starts with the question of need. Will one spouse require financial help to maintain a standard of living close to what the couple had during the marriage? There's no hard and fast rule, but in general the longer the marriage, the stronger the presumption that support is appropriate. A marriage of more than ten years is generally considered a marriage "of long duration" and usually carries with it a starting assumption that some support will be awarded. However, even after a long marriage, if you and your spouse both earn about the same amount and have roughly equivalent assets, a judge is unlikely to award support.
In any event, spousal support is still an element of a substantial number of divorce settlements and judgments, and it's definitely something you should raise if you believe you will need it. Don't be too proud to ask-in most cases, if you aren't able to completely support yourself immediately after your divorce, it's because of sacrifices that you made while you were married. This goes for both men and women. Men who earn significantly less than their wives and need support are just as entitled to ask for it as women are.
20-20 hindsight ...
I didn't even explore whether I could have gotten alimony,"