似乎你对alimony认识有误区。你可以古狗一下维基里关于alimony的解释，帮你查的

来源: jasondand 于 2011-09-15 10:25:55 [档案] [博客] [旧帖] [给我悄悄话] 本文已被阅读： 0 次 (11288 bytes)

回答: 很好奇，美国离婚一般给赡养费是怎样判定的。由 badi 于 2011-09-15 09:17:13

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alimony

Alimony is not child support.

Factors affecting alimony

The determination of alimony varies greatly from country to country and from state to state within the U.S.^[5] Some state statutes, including those of Texas, Montana, Kansas, Utah, Kentucky and Maine, give explicit guidelines to judges on the amount and/or duration of alimony. In Texas, Mississippi and Tennessee for example, alimony is awarded only in cases of marriage or civil union of ten years or longer and the payments are limited to three years unless there are special, extenuating circumstances. Furthermore, the amount of spousal support is limited to the lesser of $2,500 per month or 40% of the payee's gross income.^[21]^[22]^[23] In Delaware, spousal support is usually not awarded in marriages of less than 10 years.^[21] In Kansas, alimony awards cannot exceed 121 months.^[21] In Utah, the duration of alimony cannot exceed the length of the marriage.^[21] In Maine, Mississippi, and Tennessee alimony is awarded in marriages or civil union of 10 to 20 years and the duration is half the length of the marriage barring extenuating circumstances.^[21] Other states, including Massachusetts, California, Nevada and New York have relatively vague statutes which simply list the "factors" a judge should consider when determining alimony (see list of factors below).^[21]^[24]^[25]^[26] In these states, the determination of duration and amount of alimony is left to the discretion of the family court judges who must consider case law in each state. In Massachusetts, Mississippi, Texas and Tennessee, for example, there are 135 Appellate cases in addition to 47 sections of State Statute that shape divorce law. As a result of these Appellate Cases, for example, Massachusetts and Mississippi judges cannot order an end date to any alimony award. Most alimony awards in the states are made for life usually regardless of the length of the marriage or civil union (for marriages or civil unions over 10 years).^[24]^[27]

In general, there are four types of alimony.

这年头判alimony的州越来也少，因为现在有法律支持男女平等，且现在的家庭很多都是双职工而非以前50年代那种没有工作机会的家庭妇女。同时随着时代的变更，目前的一部分旧婚姻法的判决也会产生新问题，就是判决会使男方比较被动，比如被净身出户，甚至有配偶以此长期靠对方来赡养而不去工作的，还有父亲的探视时间收到离异配偶限制的。所以目前在判alimony的法官都比较谨慎，尤其是工薪阶层的。当然对于富人级别的，或是双发经济差别非常悬殊的，赡养费的判决会有不同。

记得蓝枪鱼妹妹曾经写过关于离婚赡养费的帖子，不过她写的比较专业也比较全面。