Does a new spouse have any financial responsibility to their stepchildren?

Back in 1998, our Appellate Court in Hudson v. Hudson held that a current spouse has no obligation to support someone else’s child subject to the reality that the current spouse may provide economic resources to the household, excluding from a parent’s gross income “income from other household members” including a current spouse who is “not legally responsible for the support of the child for whom support is being established.” Case law and court rules provide that the current spouse’s income is relevant when establishing or modifying a child support award only to the extent the parent and current spouse have children of their own, in which case the parent would qualify for an “other dependent deduction” under the Child Support Guidelines. Indeed, the guidelines expressly provide that the income of other household members including current spouses, who are not legally responsible for supporting the child, is to be excluded from the calculation of the parent’s income. Thus, the new spouse’s income is completely excluded from the child support analysis unless the parent and new spouse have children together. (And even when the parent and the new spouse do have children together, the new spouse’s income is not to be added to the other parent’s income – it is taken into account only on the “other dependent deduction” worksheet.) Note, however, that in “above the guideline” cases, i.e., the parents’ combined net income exceeds $187,200 per year, child support is to be decided based on the factors set forth in the statute, NJSA 2A:34-23(a), rather than a strict adherence to the guidelines. In other words, for those high combined earners, a current spouse’s income may become relevant to the extent if affects the parent’s standard of living and economic circumstances, from which a child should benefit.

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