AUGUST IS CHILD SUPPORT AWARENESS MONTH!

On behalf of Askvig & Johnson, PLLP 

Minnesota and several other states commemorated August as a national "child support awareness month" in order to draw attention to the ongoing problem of unpaid child support in their states.

While Minnesota may do better than average in collecting delinquent child support, missed payments of court-ordered support continue to be a growing national problem. Although some of this might be attributable to the economic collapse, statistics show that in 2009, less than half of all parents received child support on time and as ordered. This marked a sharp decrease even from two years prior, in 2007. More recent statistics are not yet available.

The awareness campaign is meant to highlight the need for ongoing child support enforcement efforts. In Minnesota, child support is designed to compensate for the fact that a family is being raised by a single parent. When a non-custodial parent does not pay as ordered, it means that his or her children are likely missing out on income that they count on and will have to sacrifice accordingly.

This is not to say that there are not many different sanctions to impose against those who do not pay their child support. In addition to the possibility of jail time or an involuntary wage garnishment, people may lose all or part of their state and federal tax refunds or any lottery jackpot that they win. Especially for those who must travel overseas, another painful consequence can be the loss of one's passport. This has, according to some reports, left some parents stranded in a foreign country until they could pay up.

Nevertheless, despite the variety of consequences, custodial parents who count on child support still need someone who can consistently hold the person who is supposed to be paying accountable for their actions. While the state's child support collection agencies can be helpful in this respect, there may be other legal support enforcement options that can be exercised, as well.

Source: GMA News, "August: National child support awareness months in US," Aug. 23, 2013

Super Lawyers!

Check out the recently released Super Lawyers for the Annual List of Top Attorneys in Minnesota for 2015. Our very own Jill Johnson was included for the second year in a row (highlight on page 60)!! Way to go, Jill! 

EXPERTS DESCRIBE FINDINGS ABOUT DIVORCE IN AMERICA

On behalf of Askvig & Johnson, PLLP 

In 2012, experts described a number of interesting findings about the state of divorce in America, and we felt that our Minnesota readers might be interested in some of them:

What might come as no surprise to many Minnesotans is that the number one indicator that a couple will not last is whether they fight about money early in the marital relationship. 

Across the socio-economic spectrum, couples that fought about financial issues early did not wind up feeling satisfied in their marriages. Interestingly, another study found divorce more common among couples that received government aid.

On the other hand, another recent study came to a surprise conclusion. Apparently, households in which the wife maintains the traditional role of doing most all of the housework are less prone to a dissolution of marriage than homes in which the husband and wife divide the housework. This may be because couples with more modern values may believe that marriage need not be considered sacred and permanent.

Another interesting report showed that when a man has a healthy relationship with his wife's family, his marriage has a better chance of enduring the test of time. However, the same is not true with respect to the wife's relationship with her husband's parents. In fact, women who reported a close relationship with their husband's families are more likely to get divorced.

Other interesting research about divorce includes reports on the significance of a woman's pre-wedding jitters, a man's tendency to turn to drinking after a divorce as well other topics. Perhaps the one common thread in all of these reports is that while no one really contemplates a divorce when he or she walks down the aisle, sometimes life circumstances occur take a couple in a different direction. In these cases, a knowledgeable family law attorney can be a huge help. A family law attorney can advise couples on how to best divide their property and assets, as well as advise them on issues pertaining to child custody, child support and spousal support.

Source: Huffington Post, "Divorce study:financial arguments early in relationship may predict divorce," July 12, 2013

HOW TO DIVIDE COMPLICATED AND SENTIMENTAL ASSETS DURING DIVORCE

On behalf of Askvig & Johnson, PLLP 

When we think about high-asset divorce here in St. Paul, the division of complicated savings accounts, stock portfolios and real estate often come to mind. These are in fact major issues when some couples divorce, and they necessitate the attention of someone who is adept in these matters. However, the real trouble is often in dividing assets that have intangible value.

For example, a retired Microsoft executive recently divorced, and it wasn't the couple's large car collection, hundreds of millions of dollars in stocks, multiple homes or their impressive Victorian antiques that held up the division of assets--it was their art collection.

The two owned an art collection of almost 50 pieces, most of them 19^th century American paintings, although they also had works by Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Claude Monet. While appraisers put the collection at $102 million, it was not exactly simple to just split the collection in half. And because both parties were attached to the art, neither wanted to sell the collection and split the proceeds. They tried at length to divvy up the paintings themselves, each ending up with about $51 million worth, but were unsuccessful.

Ultimately, a judge worked with the couple and presumably their attorneys to arrive at a satisfactory division. In the end, the woman received a majority of the pieces that she wanted most for sentimental and aesthetic reasons, ending up with 19 pieces. Her ex-husband satisfied his wishes with 24 paintings, which would cover the wall space he needed as well as count as collateral to secure a line of credit.

The division of one art collection into two is an illustration of just how much can be at stake in the division of a high-asset marriage. Art is personal and valuable, and its worth may sometimes depend on the scale and breadth of the collection it is in. Splitting something like an art collection straight down the middle, 50/50, is not typically fair or equitable.

It is important that high-net worth Minnesotans work with divorce attorneys who have experience in the intricacies of complicated property division. Such lawyers can call in specialists in order to ensure that a person's interests are protected throughout the proceedings.

Source: The Seattle Times, "The art of divorce: She gets the Monet, he gets the Renoir," Ken Armstrong, July 28, 2012

2015 Top Women Attorneys in Minnesota

Check out April's issue of Mpls St. Paul Magazine to see our very own Jill Johnson featured in the 2015 Top Women Attorneys in Minnesota list by Super Lawyers!!

MN LEGALIZED SAME-SEX MARRIAGE, WHICH ALSO LEGALIZED SAME-SEX DIVORCES

On behalf of Askvig & Johnson, PLLP

Before gay marriage became legal in Minnesota on August 1, 2013, same-sex couples who were recognized as legally married in supportive states or Canada could not receive a divorce through the Minnesota court system. As the legal director for a leading gay-advocacy group noted, "There's no ability for us to even recognize the marriage, let alone to dissolve it."

According to the 2010 U.S. Census, there are roughly 10,200 same-sex couples in Minnesota. It has been predicted that approximately 5,000 gay couples will marry within the first three years of legalizing same-sex marriages. The Williams Institute predicts that 1% of gay couples divorce in any given year.

Before same-sex marriages were legalized, gay couples in Minnesota had very few options when it came to obtaining a divorce. For example, most states have a residency requirement for divorces, meaning that at least one person from the couple must live in the state or jurisdiction for a certain amount of time before a dissolution may be initiated. In other words, at least one person from the couple would be required to physically move to a state that recognized same-sex marriages for a specific period of time. Many U.S. states have a residency requirement of a few months to a year, while Canada's residency requirement is three years. In Minnesota, the residency requirement is 180 days.

Fortunately, this is no longer an issue for same-sex couples seeking a divorce in Minnesota. Drafters of the new law note that there is no distinction between straight and gay divorces in the Minnesota statute, which allows courts to review all cases under the same terms.

Source: MinnPost, "Minnesota's new marriage law also resolves gay-divorce 'limbo'," James Nord, August 8, 2013

WILL THE CENSUS BUREAU STOP COLLECTING MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE DATA?

On behalf of Askvig & Johnson, PLLP

The U.S. Census Bureau recently decided to stop asking a series of questions about marital history through its ongoing American Community Survey. A few questions that will be removed include:

·         In the past 12 months, have you been married?

·         In the past 12 months, have you been divorced?

·         In the past 12 months, have you been widowed?

·         How many times have you been married?

·         What year were you last married?

Demographers and sociologists who fought to keep these questions on the survey have argued the U.S. Census Bureau is the only reliable source of divorce rates in the United States. Upon removal, the United States will become the only country in the developed world that does not generate annual age-specific rates of marriage and divorce.

Critics have also argued that marital history questions also allow demographers to analysis divorce and marriage rates in connection with a series of economic and cultural factors, as the answers to these questions are made in conjunction with questions regarding a person's age, race, education level and income level.

Those who opposed dropping these questions from the annual survey have blamed conservative lawmakers for their removal. These politicians have argued the marital history questions are an unconstitutional breach of privacy. However as one critic has noted, "The Census Bureau targeted the questions about marriage and divorce not because people object to answering the questions posed (it turns out that they don’t), but instead because they judged the resulting data to be of little benefit, since no legislative formulas are linked directly to them." Others have argued that the Bureau wants to drop these questions because they are not used specifically for county-level, tract-level or metropolitan area analysis, but rather apply to the country as a whole.

According to a writer from the New York Times, "A briefer questionnaire may yield less political opposition."

Source: Star Tribune, "CensusBureau wants to stop collecting marriage, divorce data," Adam Belz, November 18, 2014 and AllGov, " Census Bureau Plans to Drop Marriage and Divorce Questions," Noel Brinkerhoff, January 3, 2015.