Beyond Community of Properly — A Plea for Equity

The recent changes in the nature of marriage, and the popularity of alternative relationships, diminish the ‘special’ status of marriage. Existing and proposed methods of allocating property upon divorce fail to take into account structural gender inequalities. The laws relating to property distribution should be recast and limited to an accounting procedure which assesses the effect of the incidence of dependency on future earning capacity and seeks to allocate compensation aimed at long-term equity. Courts should base awards on lifetime earning capacities and on the effect of the marriage or relationships on these.