Spousal Support

In Ontario, for Spousal Support there are two separate questions.

The first is whether a spouse is entitled to support? A court will order spousal support:

to compensate the spouse with the lower income for sacrificing some power to earn income during the marriage;
to compensate the spouse with the lower income for ongoing care of children; or
to help a spouse who is in financial need if the other spouse has the ability to pay.

If entitled to support, the second is to determine the appropriate amount of support?

The amount is generally based, at least in part, on federal guidelines which, unlike the mandatory child support rules, only guide a court in its rulings. The guidelines without children are very arithmetic. When children are involved the calculation gets a little more complex.

Support Calculator

It is common to use a support calculator. The one to which the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General website provides a link is my support calculator. For a quick look at what the results look like, it also lets you load some sample information.