Abstract

This Article proposes a new alternative to the labor-centered marital property rule. Instead of focusing on how property was acquired, marital property law should look to spouses' overall financial resources and require them to share these resources to the extent they shape their identities during the marriage. Financial capability affects some of the most fundamental aspects of our lives-our health, our education, our work, the neighborhood in which we live. Marriages in which these aspects of spouses' identities are kept separate strike us as jarring. Imagine a husband and wife who sleep in the same bed, under the same roof, but who receive dramatically different levels of medical care.

I do not propose that all preexisting, gifted, and inherited property belong to the marriage. Rather, the approach introduced in this Article attributes a percentage of separate property to the marriage based on the length of the marriage and on the property owner's life expectancy. The core concept is to spread separate property over the life of the owner spouse and to allocate to the marriage a pro rata portion of this property.

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2008

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