Step Talk

In the US, spouses salaries are NOT considered. Where I live I know that for sure and I'm pretty sure about the entire country. We have absolutely NO RIGHTS when it comes to the skids so why would salaries or anything else we do be a consideration? If you play the lotto, make sure you are the one to buy the tickets so that she can't get her money grubbing hands on a dime (if you are lucky enough to win)!!

My income or lack thereof has never been considered, nor was the kids' stepfather's. The only thing that factored into it was the income of the bio parents. If a stepparent adopts a stepchild, then they no longer are "step" anything and that new relationship is the same as if you'd given birth to that child.

Now, I do know that there are some states where if the stepparent is standing in loco parentis for an absent bio parent who has essentially abandoned the kids and the step is raising the kids as his/her own and the kids have every reasonable expectation that the stepparent will continue to financially support them, then those stepparents CAN be ordered to continue that support. But it's rare and there are so many convoluted things that have to be taken into consideration. If you hold yourself out to be a parent to the children and you assume the responsibility of raising them and supporting them, then if the bio parents are absent or dead, you could be considered to have a legal obligation to support them. But that's an extreme case and not really the norm.

~ Anne ~

I get very little say in the skids lives, so it really seems fair that I am not legally required to pay. I have considered helping them with educational things, but I'm not down for giving up my rent money for uber expensive video games.

I think it's fair that the step-parents contribution should be in line with their values.

Thanks again to Anne and Stepped On

PS - This is probably the only interactive support I've ever had from other steps that had to struggle. That is why I have so many questions. I've been trying to figure it out on my own for years.

I think that a lot of people think that if I were a "good" step-mom I wouldn't have problems, so I either don't talk about it or I act like everything is fine.

I hear BM's talking about how they parent and I'm always like "Da#$, the skids would call the cops on me if I asked them to do that chore."

but IT CAN HAPPEN.

I have a good friend. She married a fellow who was previously married with children a few years back, and guess what. BM took x, her husband, back to court. Judge ruled that her, my friend's, income was and is to be included as household income, they were a two family income, therefore it was used to adjust the cs, and they were ordered to pay more cs to BM... IT WAS TOTALLY AND UTTERLY BULLSHIT. While it is against the law, there is no credibility for the judges out there to hold them accountable for their rulings. I have also heard first hand accounts from two other friends who had similar things happen in my state. I saw first hand the paperwork and the paycheck stub of two of my friends. The BM literally went after them financially because all of a sudden, x is remarried, pulling in two incomes, and they both decided to weasel their ways into the x's spouses income. They could barely make ends meet.

So, while it is totally against the law, it happens in my state, and I know three people off the top of my head where the spouse's income was taken into consideration on some level. One of my friends complete paycheck in conjunction of her husband's was considered as HIS TOTAL INCOME, the other friend had a portion of her paycheck that the judge considered "household/family" portion with her husband's. So, while they may not actually TAKE the income from the new spouse's paycheck, the court factor in this amount as a total income for the x (BD), because he was head of household in both cases. So, they took that from the BD's paycheck. One was my friend's husband's complete whole paycheck, and practically close to everything from my other friend's husband's paycheck. (We often laughed and asked if they had the same judge... but they didn't. When we looked at the history of the judges, both were very radical biased judges and always ruled for the mothers regardless.) The third friend, I don't know what happened. But they went back to court and got a better ruling.

Because of this alone, that is why we have chosen for me NOT to work for the past year until we get SD's cs case all settled. Maybe it's just in the area that we live in, I don't know, but I've run into so many couples with their own horror stories about cs in this state. We can't afford to have any of my income to be factored in, so we decided that while we can barely get by without me working, once everything is said and done, if I have to, I will go back to work part time. If BM takes us back to court, at least then my income that I bring in won't be enough for the court to recognize as substantial, but rather, because of the fall out of cs before we started, if that makes since.

In Texas step-parent's income is NOT considered. But the custodial parents income isn't considered either. Example, If BM has custodial custody (kids sleep, eat, etc, at her house more) her income does not factor. If she makes $80,000.00 annually and EX Spouse makes $35,000.00, EX spouse who has 2 children still pays 28% of his income towards child support, PERIOD! Everybody always thinks of it being great UNTIL you think of it reversed, ALL men do NOT make more than ALL Women. BTW in our case it's JOINT Custody when dealing with medical, education, etc, but she had primary physical cutody ALTHOUGH, and this is hilarious she has the kids from pick-up of school on Monday afternoon until drop off of school on Thursday morning, we pick up Thursday afternoon and keep until Monday morning where we take them to school, however because Husband has WORKED HARD and makes a very good income, (we really can't complain on the income) he is a 6 figure wage earner, she (BM) receive $3,000.00 a month child support) and in my opinion we have the kids just as much as she does, and SHE has to contribute NOTHING, and I do mean nothing, We pay 100% medical, she gets to file the kids on taxes EACH and EVERY year.
Now I am going to remove the anger from this statement and I truly would like to know TAX purposes, If you are not contributing more than $3,000.00 PER month toward your kids, because we're paying $3,000.00, so in order for you to be able to say you are paying for all of the kids needs you would need to be paying more than we are paying, why do you get to file the kids on taxes as dependents when they are NOT dependant on you, they are, as well as you (if truth be told) dependant upon us. I don't get this part of family court.

And before I get hit up with all the BM's out there about how much, rent, food, car, etc cost, this is not the case here, This BM lives in an all bills paid, hood-rat, roach infested, crime ridden, $125.00 a MONTH I repeat $125.00 a month apartment, she drives a 1992 vehicle, and is always ALWAYS in designer clothes, eats out for dinner EVERY night, and takes cruises, vacations, spas, etc. Don't give me she CAN't afford to get out of a $125.00 a month apartment and drive a better and decent car. She is pocketing and splurging the child support and doesn't want to GROW UP and get a HOUSE, a future or anything nice for the kids because it would hinder her spending.

Sorry for the venting.....this just brought up too many painful memories of this woman.

"Be there for the joy. Be there for the tears. Be there for each other."
(Step-Mom the Movie 1998)

In Ontario, if Dad is paying CS, only his income is factored in...no other. Doesn't matter is mom makes $110,000 and dad makes 30000, he still pays according to the chart. That is fair in my opinion!

Child Support is set based on his income alone and what the chart says....But spousal support CAN BE affected by your new partners income.
I was laid off my job....and the judge mentioned that it qualified as a 'material change in circumstance' in Hubby's household and granted our petition to have spousal support to his X stopped...this fact, in combinatin with many others is what did it.

Would it work the other way...so X could petition for more...good question...because 'officially' I don't think it's supposed to..but a good lawyer can get around it...I think.

For example, part of spousal support entitlement comes from one spouses 'ability to pay' and the others 'need'...so technically if you working frees up more 'free' money for him....then he may now have 'ability to pay' from the extra income in his pocket as you contribute more to househood expenses.....

That's how I've seen spousal support work in Canada.....but they don't like to mess with an order once it's in place...and I think it's the exception to consider new spouses income......we had many other significant circumstances in our case against his X.

We met with the attorney last month and if we are filing jointly I have to disclose my income in order for the program to calculate DH tax burden for purposes of chidl support. Other than that, the dissomaster program doesn't rely on my income to calculate child support. However, if we ever wind up in court, I have an instinct that my income might influence the judge to not give DH any breaks where there is any discretion, as unfair as that is.

Your right ... there is a huge area of grey. And although things like that don't matter 'officially'....in reality they do. We had so much evidence of lies, deception, withholding information, questionable documents....as far as x goes...
The judge did not look on her favourably..because of it all. So instead of looking for a legal way to give her what she asked for which was spousal support until the day she died basically. The judge looked for the legal way to give us what we asked for..which was retroactive termination of spousal support.

We are going to meet with the divorce attorney again. This is my situation: My husband and I just got married in December in February he will be divorced for 2 years. In divorce decree it said that she would pay off certain debt and he would pay off certain debt. He has paid his parts, but there is one credit card in his name that SHE was supposed to pay she hasn't paid it off yet. She has been late paying it, and while right now we are not seeing a negitive things on his credit report but I could see it happening soon. The x is upset that now that we are married she thinks we are making so much more money and shouldn't be worried about it, but I disagree.... She has now said that she is going to take him back to court to try to get the 50/50 custody agreement changed and try to get child support from him because he has an increased income!!!! We even have taken over the insurance which she is supposed to take care of but we can get it so much cheaper through my company. Why won't she realize I am not going to hurt the kids, and they are really blessed to have an extra person looking out for them!!!!

and our attorney told me that she (bm) is entitled to know my financial records, but they cannot factor my income into cs. What they can do is look at our household income, and figure out what my obligations are to our household, and offset my dh's obligations to our household, which then can figure into cs.

I personally have not seen this go through, our attorney wouldn't allow it, and my income has never been factored into cs. When it all boils down, only bm's income and dh's income are used to figure out cs.

We went to court two years ago and the money grabbing ex tried to obtain money from me. I just sold my house and I make good money and she tried hard to get a piece of it (and she wonders why I dislike her) and in Ontario they would not even consider it. I am sure it pissed her off...not sure why because she still got a lot of money from the ex. Guess when you are greedy you want it all.

I also live in WA state. My husbands last and second wife before me was very concerned about my husbands first wife getting a hold of her money. The legal workaround they used was for her to "not" tell my husband how much money she makes. That way he couldn't fill it out on the CS forms.

Ex wife number two is extremely aggressive about money so I suspect she will try to go after my income eventually. I can use the trick of filing separately and not telling my husband how much I make. That way she will have to jump through a bunch of legal hoops to get any of that information which will cost her money.

I have been told twice by my husbands attorney that she can't go after my money. I stand to make a lot more money than my husband nets because he has two ex's in the picture that get half his income.

My plan is to avoid any of my husband's children finding out that I am employed for as long as possible. I am pretty serious about not sharing my hard earned income with women who intentionally alienate me from my skids. I would legally divorce my husband before I would share with them. I am willing to pay an attorney a lot of money to avoid that step though.

I know that sounds harsh, but the situation is pretty knarly. I've spend 6 years in college and getting a certificate plus training in all kinds of software. I'm not willing to give my earnings to someone just because they had a kid with my husband during a previous marriage.

Well, thanks for all the input once again.

// Susanna

"One breath at a time is an acceptable plan."
Ani DiFranco

What I was told by my attorney is that since he is living with this woman and she also has an income, the court can take that into account. It makes paying the bills less of a burden since there are 2 incomes. However, they cannot base the cs on your combined income. Does that make sense?

Susanna, I completle agree with you. I wouldn't want to do that either and I am not a step mom, just an ex but that certainly would not be fair.

I know in my case that it really is irrelevent how much his girlfriend makes because he makes in the high six figures. My ex has been trying to take away our daughters horse which is her passion in life. He is trying to say that he can't afford it. He does have a house that he owns and I have the old family house. He actually has less expenses now that we are divorced. We had a beach house which we sold and it was much more expensive than the home he has now so what a crock that he can't afford it.

Good luck