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The reason the court can get involved in a divorce situation and not (at least to the extent of college tuition) for married people is that the couple ASKED the court to get involved when they filed the divorce petition. Courts don’t tell married people how to manage their money (until they fail to pay a bill and the creditor sues), what to feed their kids, how much to spend on food, housing, etc., but when they file that divorce petition, then involved the courts do get.</p>
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<p>This is a very good point. </p>
<p>I know someone whose husband was essentially forcing her to fully support their child…even to the point of having to buy the child’s health insurance, even tho the dad could get it cheap thru work. </p>
<p>But, once they filed for divorce, the “magic” of the court system required him to support their child AND provide health insurance. </p>
<p>I remember when a rather famous writer wrote that while she was married, she got few breaks from watching their kids, but once she divorced, her ex essentially had to take the kids every other weekend. Of course he could have asked for no visitation, but likely that would have looked bad. </p>
<p>While married, the courts don’t get involved with these issues, but once the courts are involved with a divorce process, they’re going to order who pays for what, and so forth.</p>
<p>Full pay at Rutgers is $31,430 for the more expensive programs, about a thousand less for the cheaper ones “Cost Includes Tuition & Fees, Room & Board, Books, Travel and Miscellaneous Expenses”.</p>
<p>This situation just shows how hopeless it is for kids who have parents able to pay who won’t. Like, if you want to go to an expensive school, frame your parents for cheating on each other and you can go?</p>
<p>As for the divorced vs. married being “settled” as in the courts can only infringe upon parental rights if you get divorced, it would be interesting to see the divorced vs. never married parents comparison. </p>
<p>Could the act of getting married, and not divorced until after the children are out of college, protect parents from having to pay their children’s college expenses, or even all expenses, up until age 24?</p>
<p>(Also - if I remember correctly, weren’t they going to pay half of the in-state cost originally, but she wanted them to pay more for her to go to Temple instead? So is this really a win for the parents?)</p>
<p>In most states, the obligation to support a kid terminates at age 18. Many agreements entered into by the parent on divorce go further, because one (or both) of the parents want the kid’s college expenses to be paid, and want to make sure that the other parent pays his or her part. Depending on how it’s structured, this might or might not create an independent right on the part of the kid against the parents, as opposed to just being enforceable between the two parents (and subject to modification or waiver by them).</p>
<p>Non-divorced parents most certainly do have an obligation to support their children. It doesn’t come up constantly in court, because there’s usually no controversy: parents - happily - typically perform their obligations. Also - somewhat less happily - when they don’t, it’s often in a situation where either or both: (i) they have so little money there’s not much point in pursuing legal remedies against them or (ii) the kid drops through the cracks and nobody takes an interest in helping him. Nevertheless, enforcement of the rights of children against their undivorced parents does wind up in court from time, and there’s a whole system in various jurisdictions for appointing guardians ad litem to act on behalf of the kids. Such proceedings are insufficiently exciting and sexy to attract any media coverage.</p>
<p>Unmarried parents also have child support obligations. Proceedings to enforce that obligation against a parent (usually a father) who never married the other parent are fairly commonplace.</p>
<p>The relevance of Rutgers: after the 1982 New Jersey case (Newburgh) that established the obligation of parents to pay college tuition, for a time the courts applied what was referred to as the “Rutgers rule,” which essentially was that they weren’t required to pay more than the in-state cost of Rutgers (that being the New Jersey state university). The rule was tossed aside in Finger case in 2000. If you read the Black v. Black opinion, it discusses all this, and tries to apply some rational principles, which aren’t as simple as the Rutgers rule, but depend on the particular facts of each case. What’s going on in the case the news media have seized upon is more mysterious.</p>
<p>New Jersey is one of about 3 states that does extend child support through college age without consent of the parents. Many states cut it off at 18 or when the child graduates from high school, as that is the legal end of responsibility. Moral end of responsibility? Different issue.</p>
<p>If I were a divorced (not-poor) parent, and I knew that my ex was helping pay for college, I don’t think I would want the “political hit” that I would take if I didn’t do my fair share. </p>
<p>That’s what I don’t understand. How can a NCP with a good income expect to have a good relationship with their child in such a circumstance?</p>
<p>It’s one thing when parents can’t pay, but when they can and they simply pull the “child support ends at 18” flag, then surely their relationship with their child is going to suffer.</p>
<p>On the divorced-as-compared-to-married topic:</p>
<p>The college-expense situation is really a special case. The states that enforce an obligation by divorced parents to pay college expenses - one of which is New Jersey - typically base the obligation on the notion that a child shouldn’t be worse off (in that respect) on account of the divorce. Typically one of the factors in creating the obligation is whether the parents would have paid college expenses if they’d stayed married. That’s the first factor in the standard list (taken from Newburgh) New Jersey courts set forth in their opinions on the subject. If the obligation depends on what the parents would have done if they stayed married, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to enforce it where they are still married - when they’re doing exactly what they’re doing.</p>
<p>This whole topic reminds me of the fact that Twenty-eight states currently have laws making adult children responsible for their parents if their parents can’t afford to take care of themselves…Although they don’t usually enforce it some times they do.</p>
<p>^^^^
don’t other states recognize the divorce agreements/orders of other states? If not, people would just leave the state whenever they didn’t like orders (like child support).</p>
<p>It would make sense for parents to open 529 accts so that if they were to divorce later, the existence of the 529 would demonstrate the intent to financially support college costs.</p>
<p>Most states have enacted the Uniform Child Custody and Jurisdiction Act. That act determines what state the ‘marriage’ (or even just the family if there wasn’t a marriage) should be used as the base for determining what laws should control. That prevents ‘forum shopping’. For example, if a couple was living in California but wants to avoid community property laws or California’s child support laws, they can’t do it by just getting divorced in Nevada. They can file in Nevada, but the laws of California will be used.</p>
<p>So in this case, the ‘situs’ of the marriage/family life was NJ. Even if both parents move out of NJ and the 21 year old child sues them in PA, NJ laws would be used. The problem is, of course, the PA lawyers and judges are not as familiar with the law and everyone will have to work twice as hard - they’ll want to keep the matter in NJ.</p>
<p>And who pushed the states to adopt the uniform support obligations legislation? One-sided advocates who care little about the true detrimental emotional impact to children, that’s who. These problems typically arrive when the parents are hardheaded or vindictive. Now in this latest NJ case, the divorced parents are united in their determination that their daughter consider their wishes, if she wants them to foot the bill. Divorce and child support obligations should not be an excuse to let self absorbed children (or angry ex-spouses) to run riot without limitation.</p>
<p>Tangent to this thread, I heard that in some country where the kind of college a student gets into could largely determine the quality of his/her future job or even social status/class, the parents who refuse to pay for their offspring’s college education, if he/she gets into one of these colleges, will be greatly despised by the whole society (to the extent that they may be rejected by their social circle and they may even lose their job or their clients if they run their own business.) There may not be law to govern this, but the social pressure for the parents to do so is extremely high. I do not claim that their “system” is better because it could waste their finacial resources unwisely because of this “education fever” - I heard their government even has a need to pass a law which requires their young students to stop their school work and to be sent home from the (supplentary/cram) school by 11 pm. (By the way, I also heard that it is the pressure of following the “socially expected behavior”, not the law, that keeps their crime rate very low.)</p>
<p>What happens if the parents refuse to pay while the case goes through appeals? Will Temple close her account and refuse to let her attend classes? The courts may be able to say the parents have to pay for school, but can they say a college (esp. an OOS one) has to allow a student to attend when the parents aren’t paying?</p>
<p>But do the universities in those countries cost as much as they do in the US relative to typical income and wealth levels (even after accounting for financial aid and scholarships)?</p>