On Friday, I published an op-ed in the Boston Globe on the particular injustices of Massachusetts alimony laws, which inflict grave financial and emotional hardships on young and middle-age, middle-class people in no-fault divorces. The current laws are so extreme that two prominent lawyers told me that they believe they have "a chilling effect on marriage" in the state. Even prenups don't help, because judges routinely ignore them. (N.B. Don't count on the lawyer who does your prenup to mention this.)
Until my op-ed appeared on Friday, many legislators had no idea about the worst of these laws, because they are case law, not statute. No legislator has ever ruled on these practices. For the most part, they are known only to victims and beneficiaries, among whom I include divorce lawyers.
By Friday afternoon, the op-ed had made ripples -- and a few waves. A woman who had plans to marry a divorced man in September phoned Mass Alimony Reform, which is leading the reform movement, and said that she had canceled her wedding. Since then, emails have poured in from other women, with cancellations and questions about whether to marry divorced men.
I'm one of the people on whom these laws have had a chilling effect. My partner has alimony obligations, and if we marry, his obligations could indirectly, or directly, become mine. If his circumstances change because of illness or retirement, and he goes back to court to reduce his payments, my income and assets would likely be considered in assessing what he has available to give his ex. Sometimes, if a man remarries, his ex automatically goes back to court, asserting that she has "needs" and her ex now has new means -- those belonging to his wife, even if she has a menial job and few resources.
Divorce in Massachusetts means never have to say goodbye to your ex. It means a lifetime of new relationships with divorce lawyers. Instead of vacations and new cars, you can look forward to repeat visits to divorce court, when circumstances change. Decades after your divorce, you can be summoned to court, or you can do the summoning yourself.
Massachusetts is the only state in the country with laws like these. In the other 49 states, divorces mean "the end," and the income of new spouses is irrelevant to alimony in post-divorce modifications.
Massachusetts alimony law is gender neutral, but 96 percent of payers are men paying women - often 30 to 40 percent of gross earnings. It's not unusual for women who work full-time to receive alimony for life, even women working in high-paying fields or very specialized fields, including nursing, finance, and real estate.
Why should the rest of the country care about divorce laws of this one state? It's always been a symbol of enlightenment, tolerance, and education. It's home to the country's preeminent colleges and universities, including colleges that have educated the most celebrated women in American history. It's known throughout the world as the state that first sanctioned gay marriage. But it's known increasingly as the state whose divorce laws are so out of whack that they discourage marriage. Here's the truth: gays can marry here, but straight people can't truly get divorced. Now that women are the presidents of both Harvard and MIT, does the state really want to boast of having two classes of women: those who are never expected to lift a finger to support themselves or their children and those whose labor is required to help support them? Is this the image that the education state wants for itself?
But here's some good news: I hear that lawyers are thrilled at the new gay marriage law. Why? Because there are so many new opportunities to write wills and prenups, and so many new divorces to look forward to. Gay advocates please take note: when gays begin to get divorced from longer term marriages -- even five years long -- these alimony laws will apply to them.
Alimony is awarded even in short-term marriages. Judges have unlimited discretion in the Mass Probate Courts. They answer to no one. And few people can afford appeals.
Wedding planners, caterers, florists, hoteliers, Chambers of Commerce, take note. It's wedding season. Your business will suffer until these laws are changed.
When news of the laws spreads across the country, men and women may make different decisions about where to live and work, when they write off Massachusetts as a sane place to make their home. Will business leaders protest? Will the presidents of colleges and universities take an interest in reform, to make sure that they don't lose faculty because of these laws?
One of the leaders promoting legislation that will fix the broken system is Steve Hitner, who started Mass Alimony Reform in 2007, after a shattering experience in the family court system. A judge told Hitner, who owns a small copying and printing company and was forced into bankruptcy by alimony obligations, that when he runs out of money to borrow on his credit cards to pay his ex, the judge will throw him in jail. The judge also said that she realized that he wouldn't ever be able to do anything generous for his grown children because of his alimony ($865 a week, for life), but she wouldn't reduce his payments. Why? He owns his own business, and she did not trust any of his financial documents, including evidence that his business declined after 9/11. Hitner's second wife had to get a second job in order to send alimony payments to his ex. If she didn't come up with the money, he would have gone to jail.
Judges have sent men to jail who couldn't make payments because they lost jobs and had no income. At least one judge awarded alimony payments that were higher than the man's income.
Soon after starting Mass Alimony Reform, Hitner was surprised to get calls from women -- forced to pay alimony to their husband's ex-wives. One of them, Deb Scanlan, started The 2nd Wives Club. Both organizations support HR 1567, a comprehensive reform bill that is modeled on California's alimony laws, known to be very protective of women's situations in divorce.
The Joint Judiciary Committee in the state legislature held a day of hearings in January, and the heartbreak was palpable. But that didn't keep legislators from sending the bill for "study," a polite form of death. Still, one legislator told a constituent:
"At first we thought people who opposed alimony were rich guys who had dumped their wives for younger women. But we saw clearly that the laws are hurting ordinary people, women and children of second marriages."
There is no opposition to HR 1567. No women's groups have come forward. The only people who go negative when talking about the bill are divorce lawyers, the more prominent the more negative. One insists that the legislature doesn't want to pass new law. Another asserts that the solutions for the problems stemming from lifetime alimony are "guidelines" for judges, not legislation, even though judges have unlimited power. Another says that HR 1567 wouldn't be good for one of her clients who has triplets. The lawyer ignored the provision of HR 1567 that allows for exceptions. The lawyer has no interest in improving the bill.
The lawyers don't say so directly, but there is no other conclusion to reach except that they are opposed to legislation. It's too specific, too prescriptive. Translation: They want vagueness and generality because it means they have to try every case anew, and bill for every hour. Lifetime alimony and murky laws are a lifetime windfall for divorce lawyers. If I'm wrong about the lawyers and their intentions, I invite them to propose legislation -- not "guidelines" for judges -- that will help ordinary citizens. I invite them wholeheartedly into this conversation. When we hire them, they think creatively about how to use the laws to our advantage. Let's hear from them about how to rewrite the laws, so that in keeping with the ideals of state, there is fairness, equity, and justice for all.
Family law varies wildly from state to state. Typically and tragically, women and children are given short shrift. As the daughter of a deadbeat dad, I know this first-hand. Inequities and injustice need to be repaired wherever they exist.
Massachusetts owes it to the rest of the country, not to mention to its own men, women, and children, to have divorce laws that are a symbol of our best selves, the selves that support justice, common sense, women's rights, and equal protection of the laws. We are a long way from that. Until then, my advice will not please the Chamber of Commerce or the Bar Associations: look elsewhere for love or make choices that will have the Puritans rolling in their graves: avoid lawyers and live in sin with the one you love.
Elizabeth Benedict is a novelist and journalist whose works appears in The New York Times, Daedalus, and The Huffington Post. For a copy of her essay "What I Learned About Sex on the Internet," please click here (LINK: www.elizabethbenedict.com).
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Wow. I am a resident of Massachusetts and had no idea that these laws existed. Thank you for bringing this issue to light!
There are times when former spouses should have lifetime alimony. For example, a first wife may have put her husband through school, thereby investing in his earning power. Or she may have taken ten years out of her career to raise their children and therefore have sacrificed her potential future earning power. Or she may have worked part-time. Or they may have built up a business together. Marriage is an economic partnership and sometimes that part of it goes on after divorce.
I don't think second wives should be paying a man's alimony. I do think there's some sense in looking at the total financial picture of the man though. If you're married, your income is not just what you yourself earn. You are better off than someone without a spouse. You can't expect to be treated the same.
I do think that people should not have children in two families if they can't support them all. The obligation should be to the children in the first marriage. So I think if you want kids, a divorced man who already has kids might not be a good choice.
Unfortunately, I think judges have good reason in general to be skeptical about people hiding assets. That may have been unfair in this case. Was there any reason the judge didn't trust or believe this particular person?
Nationally, men do much better financially after divorce than women. I would be curious to know what the situation is in Mass.
It's really ironic that they made new laws to stop people from abusing welfare a short time ago. They now have a program that makes people go out and learn skills and get to work in a certain amount of time and then they cut off benefits...yet it's ok for husbands to pay alimony to lazy ex wives who absolutely have the ability to work but choose not to so they can live off of their cash cow forever and the courts let them get away with it. Many have live in boyfriends who reap the benefits of that check paid by their girlfriends ex husband also.
Imagine being married 22 years...having your wife decide that Keno is great fun to the tune of spending her own children's college fund that you've put together and charging up credit card debt that you work three jobs to pay off because she refuses to work... only to have the courts grant lifetime alimony so she has plenty of Keno cash to gamble for the rest of your life while you still pay all the bills for the kids and not only your residence but hers too! Nice state we live in. God bless you all for coming together and trying to make some changes. This has just been so unfair to so many hard working people.
We have men in jail all over the country for failure to pay child support. Does anyone really think men would go to jail if they had the money to pay?
Yes. A good family friend of mine had a baby with a man who eventually walked out one day. She simply wanted him to contribute to paying child support toward the child they had agreed to raise together--there was NO alimony or any such thing involved. Moreover, she always worked full-time and was not looking to be supported--she just wanted the father to contribute his fair share toward raising their child. The father moved out-of-state and spent the next several years hiding assets and avoiding making what were very reasonable child-support payments--the whole time he had the money to pay, he just thought he could game the system. Going to jail ended up being the only thing that finally persuaded him to support his child.
I think Mass. alimony laws clearly need reform. However, people being financialy irresponsible has NOTHING to do with the need for reform of MA alimony laws. I have ZERO respect for people who have children--whether they are a woman or man (and I am a man, by the way)--and then choose not be financially responsible for those children. I don't think that anyone who truly cannot afford to pay child support should go to jail; rather, they should have their payments reduced to an amount they can afford. However, for some people, jail is the only thing which motivates them to follow the law and keep their financial.
Wow. The guy actually went to jail rather than pay child support that he could afford? I hope his child isn't retarded. I used to run a transitional housing project (half way house) for people coming out of prison or rehab. Their employment options were extremely limited. If they got a job emptying bed pans or driving a taxi they could move to a rooming house and scrape by. That is until friend of the court caught up with them and garnished their wages. Its just not possible to live in the street while holding a job and paying child support. Its not that they don't owe the money. Its that they don't have the money.
Massachusetts' ridiculous alimony laws are one of the (many) reasons my partner and I have no plans to marry. We actually love each other too much to be married in this state- ironic, yes? We're expecting our first child in a few weeks and have been feeling pressure from our families to marry, but why on earth would we?
Who are these laws supposed to benefit? Me, as a woman? Is it supposed to give me some sort of satisfaction to know that divorcing me could mean the end of his life, financially and otherwise? No thanks, Massachusetts. My children mean more to me than that. This legislation hurts children and helps lawyers- why is it still on the books?
If you're going into a marriage thinking of the divorce, you're probably right not to get married.
Agreed. I just don't understand pre nups, unless one partner is extremely wealthy. I make more than my husband, I live in Massachusetts, but I didn't even consider a pre nup. I wouldn't have married him if I'd thought there was the possibility of divorce. Prepareing for divorce before even getting married just seems weird to me. I understand nothing is set in stone and people can change, but why would be with someone if you had so much fear that one day you could get divorced and screwed over by them?
Sure, Massachusetts is so Puritan that it has been the only state with same sex marriage for years.
Divorce laws are antiquated (look no farther than neighbor New York to find "fault" divorces and the same type of hunt-the-male practices in Massachusetts) because of religious interference in state laws. The churched just cant keep their hands off of state power in an effort to control what individuals and families do.
We need to have a 21st century secular reform movement to get the bible-thumpers and main line churched out of public policies which apply to all of us.
This is a wonderful story which perhaps understates the ill effects of having a profession which makes money off of family feuds. Get the lawyers and the churches out of our bedrooms and private relationships.
The concept of state sanctioned marriage is ridiculous anyway. The only state interest is in regard to the issue of child welfare and there are ways to make it so that couples can be compelled to work that out contractually before the birth, when the couple is more likely to be willing to negotiate amicably, without having to resort to the expensive screwing the courts give you. If one partner or the other opts out of concluding a contract or doesn't honor the terms of it, they should lose access to the child if the relationship dissolves and the only thing the other party can sue for is the amounts specified in the contract and no more. This will help kill off the phenomenon of women using their wombs as slot machines as is effectively the current practice of gold diggers and it will force women to be more responsible about who they procreate with since there would be no gaurentee that the courts or welfare agencies would bail them out.
How about the men being more responsible?! I am a guy who has "miraculously" never managed to have a child I didn't want to raise. It's called wearing a condom. You know those little rubber things you can buy for a few bucks at ANY drug store, WalMart, etc around the country. And spare me the crap about how they don't always work--nearly EVERY case of "failure" is because of human error (put on incorrectly, kept past their expiration date, oil-based lubricant used on latex even though the label clearly says NOT to do this). If you have a child through carelessness and stupidity, then oh well, sucks to be you! I am tired of this ridiculous culture we have created for both men and women where everyone is a "victim" and no one is supposed to ever be held accountable for their actions. Enough, enough! People like me are tired of paying for others' mistakes and short-comings. I have no problem helping the truly poor and needy, but I will be damned if I will see one more tax dollar of mine go to bail out the irresponsible. If you have a child, whether a man or a woman, then you AND the other parent are financially responsible for that child until the child reaches adulthood--end of story. Don't want a child? Use birth control!
Please do enlighten us on just how much of your tax dollar goes to support the children of these irresponsible fathers....
Just what I thought; another GOP idiot bitching about sharing his hard earned tax dollar with the less fortunate, or excuse me, because of the irresponsible--yet he doesn't have a clue about how much, which government agencies are robbing him, etc.
I guess you'll be damned then, as you don't now and won't ever have any say in the matter--unless you leave the country.
Pathetic.
Massachusetts likes to punish those who divorce because it is Puritan and well you know how they are?
Massachusetts is a very strange state, my friend. On the one hand we are extremely progressive, the first to legalize gay mariage. Marijuana is practically decriminalized her already (every September is the Boston Hemp Fest in which tens of thousands converge on boston common to smoke up openly, while the police mill around doing nothing) and will probably be officially decriminalized in the next five years.
Yet at the same time much of our laws were set up in a Puritanical framework and we are loathe to change them. Up until just a few years ago, stores could not sell alcohol on Sundays. Gay marriage is legal, and yet, unbelievable, oral and sodomy are STILL ILLEGAL, at least officially, in Massachusetts!!! And divorce laws are still set up to heavily punish those who get divorced.
What can I say? We're very complex.
Hear Hear. I lived in Boston for about a year back in '68 and '69. I don't know about now but in those days a person could walk into a precinct house and tell the desk sergeant that they were hungry. This would usually result in the cop giving you a "chit" redeemable for a meal at a nearby diner. That was the clearest demonstration of generosity on the part of a municipality that I have ever seen.
Huh, Alabama does better than Massachussetts, who'd of thunk it.
I am a retired family lawyer, and am distressed by what I read here. When we can not predict to our clients what the likely outcome of litigation will be because the court has wide discretion, our clients can not make reasonable decisions. When judges have wide discretion, they are free to favor the clients of their lawyer buddies, or the lawyers who contribute to their campaign funds. (Alabama has elected lawyers who collect contributions even in years when they are not up for re-election; I don't know what Massachusetts system of judicial selection is.)
Keep on writing about this and urging the citizens of Massachusetts to pressure their legislature.
MsLiz,
I wrote to my congressman, Michael capuano, and my attorney general upon reading the Boston Globe article. I hope many of my fellow citizens will do the same.
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Posted June 16, 2008 | 05:39 PM (EST)