Myth #9-The Unemployed Spouse has the Advantage, So Quit

NO, absolutely not. The courts look at income, true. However if the court has reason to believe that one spouse is “voluntarily” unemployed, or worse, unemployed to manipulate the end result of the divorce, the judge may “impute” income to the unemployed spouse. What this means is that the judge is able to say, you were earning 120,000 a year, for several years, therefore, I will use what you used to earn when determining the earnings of each spouse. This is the case not only for unemployed, but also for being voluntarily under employed as well.