Divorce Lawyers: The Civil Code vs. Revised Statues for Child Support in Louisiana

In Louisiana, there are two main sources of legal authority for divorce lawyers.  One comes from the Louisiana Civil Code, and the other comes from the Louisiana Revised Statutes.  Generally, the Louisiana Civil Code is a more overarching and broad explanation of some family law concepts and the Revised Statutes are where many of the nuts and bolts of a particular area of family law are hashed out.

Divorce lawyers can typically see this difference very easily when looking at child support laws in Louisiana.  While the Civil Code barely gives any mention of the rules and regulations attendant to child support in our state, the Revised Statutes break down this concept in an intensely rigorous and analytical fashion.

Something like child support probably needs an in depth economic framework because it involves accounting for the incomes of the spouses.  If you think about it, there are so many variables which could come into play for divorce lawyers when determining how much is a fair amount to pay in child support that the whole process can be pretty staggering.  For example, Revised Statute 9:315(B)(1) explains that the schedule developed for child support payments has “been adjusted” to reflect Louisiana’s status as “a low income state.”  Let’s pause right there for a second.  Keep in mind that a parent is not going to be responsible for making sure their child has the upbringing which they might have in Boston or New York (where living expenses are presumably much higher) but only the upbringing which a child in Louisiana would have.  Louisiana recognizes that they cannot hold their parents to the national average, but to the Louisiana average.

In so doing, this state uses what is known as the “Income Shares” model.  This framework takes into account the relative contributions which each parent had made to the family (or “household expenses) during the course of the marriage or relationship and uses these contributions to gauge their ability to make payments in the future. 

Remember, divorce lawyers are generally talking about “income” here, and not “salary.”  Generally, that is going to mean that most (if not all) sources of money which one spouse or parent has coming in will be counted towards their share.  This can include: salaries, wages, commissions, bonuses, dividends, severance pay, pensions, interest, trust income, recurring monetary gifts, annuities, capital gains, social security benefits, workers' compensation benefits, basic and variable allowances for housing and subsistence from military pay and benefits, unemployment insurance benefits, disaster unemployment assistance received from the United States Department of Labor, disability insurance benefits, and spousal support received from a pre-existing spousal support obligation.

Divorce lawyers may advise that there are some things which may be specifically excepted from being “gross income” however.  For example, “disaster assistance” payments received from FEMA or other non-profit organizations, gifts received by the domiciliary spouse by someone who gives the gift as a way to offset the failure of the non-domiciliary spouse to pay child support, and also the “extraordinary overtime” received by one parent if its inclusion would be prejudicial to that parent.

This above is informational only, not legal advice. Will Beaumont. New Orleans.