Wife and husband have a 16 year marriage in Massachusetts. Wife owns business which has been support for household. Husband has refused to work. Husband wants alimony calculated on wife's gross salary plus car paid for by business plus health insurance premiums. The car and health insurance are paid 100% by business. Should health insurance premiums be added to wife's salary to compute her alimony payment? FYI: She provides health insurance for her children and husband. I cannot find case law on this issue.
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Case law generally comes about from appellate court and most divorces are not appealed, so it is hard or impossible to find good case law on a lot of divorce topics.
Generally, if one spouse owns a business, the other is entitled to part of it in a divorce if the business came about during the marriage.
I have never seen a judge divide the business assets up piece by piece. No one, but the judge can say how he would see fit to divide the assets, but likely he would look at the wife's income and look at the stock in the business rather than each piece of it. Most of the time, if interest in a business is contested in a divorce it is just stock.
Alimony will come directly from the salary and most local courts have a formula it goes in. After that the judge would likely just decide if the husband is entitled to part of the wife's stock.
Putvi
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I am not interested in the division of the business. For temporary alimony, the judge took the wife's salary + the cost the company was paying for her car + the cost of the health insurance premiums and then calculated alimony. I can understand the car being added but not the health insurance as it is a benefit for the entire family.
Corinne
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Is the business a sole proprietorship? It's really just up to the judge. – Putvi May 07 '19 at 22:16
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@Putvi - the question is about ongoing alimony not about the division of property. – George White May 07 '19 at 22:17
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@GeorgeWhite I never said it was about division of property. – Putvi May 07 '19 at 22:18
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Corinne - welcome to the site. if you have more information to add to your question you can edit your question. It is not really encouraged but you can also post comments to clarify your question and respond to other's comments. The correct and preferred way to add to your question is to edit your question - what is definitely not good form is to post elaborations to your questions as an answer, as you have done here. Rather than a discussion forum, this is a Q and A site. Best practice is to leave a clear question and one or more clear answers to that question for future people's edification. – George White May 07 '19 at 22:24
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"I have never seen a judge divide the business assets up piece by piece. No one, but the judge can say how he would see fit to divide the assets, but likely he would look at the wife's income and look at the stock in the business rather than each piece of it. Most of the time, if interest in a business is contested in a divorce it is just stock." is all about dividing the business which was never her question. – George White May 07 '19 at 22:26
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@GeorgeWhite lol, read on past that and it says alimony most often comes from salary, not stock in a company, which answers the question. – Putvi May 08 '19 at 15:47
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I am not sure why the judge is adding back insurance policy cost which my company is paying back to my salary in order to compute alimony. If I worked at an outside company and received 60% health insurance benefits, would the judge add the health insurance benefit from the company to my health insurance back to my salary to compute alimony? – Corinne May 09 '19 at 01:46