In Reed v. Reed , a recent unpublished (Rule 1:28) decision, the Appeals Court provided a summary of the current definition of need in Massachusetts.  Alimony is defined in  the Alimony Reform Act  as "the payment of support from a spouse, who has the ability to pay, to a spouse in need of support for a reasonable length of time, under a court order."  This means that need is one of the three main components of alimony and when it comes to calculating alimony: Need "is not based on the minimum life necessities of the spouse, but rather is measured by 'the amount necessary to support a spouse in a manner consistent with the marital life-style.'" Reed   quoting Zaleski v. Zaleski For general term alimony, the most typically awarded type of alimony, the statute also limits the amount of alimony to "generally not exceed the recipient's need or 30 to 35 per cent of the difference between the parties' gross incomes established at the time of the o...

The Massachusetts Appeals Court released a decision on December 30, 2014,   Vedensky v. Vedensky  (13-P-1392), deciding numerous issues related to the determination of alimony on a modification.  The Appeals Court upheld most of the lower court's decision except on one issue, including the payor's second job income, which caused the award to be remanded to the lower court.  This continues a trend in recent alimony cases for the Appeals Court and SJC to look very closely at awards of alimony under the still relatively new Alimony Reform Act . In Vedensky, the wife and husband entered into a Separation Agreement in 2007 that included the husband paying child support to the wife and no present alimony, but the issue of future alimony was left modifiable.  After suffering from psychological disabilities that affected his ability to work, the husband sought a reduction of his child support in 2009 on a Complaint for Modification, which obligation was terminated i...

The Alimony Reform Act of 2011 added a formula to Massachusetts Alimony determinations: "Except for reimbursement alimony or circumstances warranting deviation for other forms of alimony, the amount of alimony should generally not exceed the recipient’s need or 30 to 35 per cent of the difference between the parties’ gross incomes established at the time of the order being issued. Subject to subsection (c), income shall be defined as set forth in the Massachusetts child support guidelines." M.G.L. c. 208 s 53(b)  (emphasis added)   Mathematical formulas are convenient and many practitioners and Judges are running the formula right away to see what the boundaries of alimony are (we've even encouraged this behavior with the creation of a website calculator and iPhone App ).  But the recent decision in  Hassey  indicates that the formula should not be the first step in the alimony inquiry. The formula should not be the first step in the alimony inquiry. ...