Letter to the editor: State legislature must pass alimony reform bill

As the Florida legislature again considers legislation to reform alimony — most notably to end permanent alimony, allow for payors to stop paying alimony upon retirement, and cap the maximum alimony at 25 percent of the difference in the divorcing parties’ net income — readers should consider what divorcing couples have had to experience and learn firsthand: Florida’s alimony laws are immoral — not by design, but by their adverse impact on Florida families.

How so?

Florida law takes two well-meaning people who are divorcing — and undergoing the most emotionally-vulnerable period in their lives — and pits them into an adversarial court system led by divorce attorneys with every financial incentive to escalate fighting and generate fees (all in the name of defending their client).

As such, children get used as pawns, acrimony and insults are lobbed at every turn, and valuable family assets that could help the parties and children in their transition are used to fund a billion dollar family law industry.

Furthermore, permanent alimony does not allow divorced parties to separate entirely.

It keeps them stuck in a cycle of entitlement and resentment, which affects the families long after the divorce.

There is almost no fighting regarding child support, precisely because it is based on a clear mathematical formula.

HB 843 would do the same for alimony and hopefully reduce acrimony and uncertainty, on which divorce lawyers thrive. It will also ensure that families across Florida are treated similarly.

Michel (Michael) Bühler,

Coral Gables