Spousal support serves a very important purpose. Primarily, it is there to prevent a woman or man from being trapped in a romantic partnership for economic reasons. Indeed, this is common enough even with spousal support laws, but spousal support provides a financial avenue by which spouses can free themselves of toxic romantic partnerships that do not serve their best interests or happiness.
Spousal support, also referred to as alimony, is a temporary monetary payment made by the “moneyed” spouse to the “less moneyed” spouse, which he or she can use while trying to become financially independent. In short-term marriages and relationships where spouses are equal financially, spousal support is not usually an automatic entitlement. However, it is not necessary to be married to receive this kind of support. In a domestic partnership that involves an interdependent partner, it is called spousal support and is intended to compensate the lower-income domestic partner for sacrifices he or she made to be in the relationship.
The federal government offers its “Spousal Support Advisory Guidelines” (SSAGs), which family law lawyers utilize to estimate what spousal support could be in a given situation. Under these guidelines, length of relationship and spousal income are important for predicting how much a spouse may be required to pay in spousal support.
At Calgary Family Law associates, we are very concerned with ensuring that our clients receive the amount of spousal support they are entitled to. We also represent individuals to ensure that they are not required to pay more spousal support than what is necessary.