CHILD AND SPOUSAL MAINTENANCE INDEX

In times long past, it was altogether too easy for an irresponsible man to walk away from his financially dependent wife and children rather than providing for them. The good news is that, in recent decades, steps have been taken to entrench legislative and judicial protections for children and for women who are in that position of dependency for legitimate reasons. The bad news is that the pendulum has swung to a new extreme, one in which responsible men are being burdened with grossly unfair financial obligations: property settlements nowhere near being equal divisions, spousal support for women perfectly capable of supporting themselves, and "child support" that is mostly barely-disguised spousal support.

The purpose of this section is to discuss what *would* constitute fairness in such matters, and to detail cases in which it has been blatantly violated, together with their tragic consequences. The general discussions (labels beginning with A) and individual case studies (labels beginning with B) below are meant to reveal the problem graphically in hopes of spurring all the needed reforms.