Legal Question in Family Law in California

Once a marriage reaches the ten year mark, it is considered a long term marriage. The reason that is important is that it can affect spousal support (alimony is not a term used in California). For shorter marriages, the general rule for spousal support for half the length of the marriage, but after the marriage reaches the ten year mark, spousal support could be awarded for the life of the person receiving alimony. Child support is the same. The longer you stay married, the longer the community shares in the wages and retirement you earn.

The ten years is the statutory presumption of a long marriage for the purposes of calculating spusal support. The judge still can award spousal support for shorter marriages, and for a long duration, if other factors are present (such as a disabled spouse.)

It never ceases to amaze me how many attorneys perpetuate lay people's myths because they don't actually practice in the area of law they are pontificating about. There is nowhere in the Family Code that mentions ten years being conclusively relevant to ANYTHING. There is a case-law based presumption that a marriage of ten years or more is "of long duration," but it is only a general presumption. An 8-year marriage may be ruled "of long duration" and a 12 year marriage not. Furthermore, the only relevance is that if a marriage IS ruled to be "of long duration" then the court retains indefinite jurisdiction to extend, terminate or modify spousal support (NOT CHILD SUPPORT. Marriage length has NOTHING to do with child support. I have NO idea where Beers got that rediculous idea). BUT the court does not HAVE to retain jurisdiction over spousal support in a marriage of long duration, AND it CAN retain jurisdiction in a marriage NOT of long duration. SO BASICALLY ten years is meaningless. Lastly, regardless of the length of marriage, unless it is so short that no spousal support is warranted, support is only to be awarded long enough for the supported spouse to become self-supporting, and is generaly limited in any case to half the length of the marriage. Again, however, there is nothing about ten years involved.

I love where Mr. McCormick writes these moronic tirades, and then I get to come back and actually cite the law that shows where he is wrong.

"For the purpose of retaining jurisdiction, there is a presumption affecting the burden of producing evidence that a marriage of 10 years or more, from the date of marriage to the date of separation, is a marriage of long duration." (Fam. Code, section. 4336, subd. (b).)

That statute specifies the presumptions regarding the court's retention of jurisdiction to award spousal support. It does not come from case law, it comes from the statute.