Florida lawmakers tweaking alimony

MIAMI — In the waning days of this year’s legislative session, Florida lawmakers and advocacy groups are pushing to overhaul the state’s alimony law in a bid to better reflect today’s marriages and make the system less burdensome for the alimony payer.

Florida joins a grass-roots movement in a growing number of states that aims to rewrite alimony laws by curbing lifelong alimony and alleviating the financial distress that some payers — still mostly men — say they face. The activists say the laws in several states, including Florida, unfairly favor women and do not take into account the fact that a majority of women work and nearly a third have college degrees.

The Florida House recently approved legislation that would make lifelong alimony more difficult to award and less onerous for the payer and, in the case of a remarriage, would place a new spouse’s income off-limits in awarding payments. Attention turns to the Senate, where the companion bill is less far-reaching.

Traditionally, alimony was designed to prevent divorced women who did not work and were less educated from falling into poverty. According to this view, the woman’s job was to raise children and run the household. Today, with both spouses often working, that situation is far less common. The question now is: What is fair alimony in the 21st century?

“I think that with my parents and certainly their parents, there were far less women in the workforce,” said Rep. Ritch Workman, RMelbourne, who is sponsoring the House bill in Florida. “The concept of a woman, after 15 years being married, to enter the workforce and survive on her own was ludicrous. It was an obligation of the ex-husband to support her until she found another husband. I am sure that’s insulting to today’s women that they have to go from one husband to the next to be supported. It is not antiwoman to say that out loud.”

Last year, the Legislature in Massachusetts, which had some of the country’s most antiquated alimony laws, passed without opposition a measure to rewrite the laws and make them more equitable, following the recommendations of a special commission.

Connecticut lawmakers are drafting an alimony bill, with hearings expected in the next month, lobbyists say. And in Arkansas, the Carolinas, West Virginia, Oregon and other states, activists are setting up “Alimony Reform” groups, collecting stories about the hardships of long-term alimony payments and presenting them to lawmakers.