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SOCIAL SECURITY - GOVERNMENT PENSIONS
© 1998 National Legal Research Group, Inc.
RHODE ISLAND: Schaffner v. Schaffner, 713 A.2d 1245 (R.I. 1998).
The husband's federal civil service pension should be valued without deducting the hypothetical amount of Social Security benefits he would receive if he had participated in the Social Security system.
This decision is yet another rejection of the view that the value of a spouse's pension should be reduced if the pension took the place of Social Security benefits.
Like many other government employees, the husband participated in a civil service retirement plan rather than the Social Security system. In the parties' divorce proceedings, he claimed that the trial judge should have deducted from the value of his civil service pension the amount that he would have received in Social Security benefits if he had participated in the Social Security system. The pension should be shielded from equitable distribution to the extent it substituted for Social Security benefits because Social Security benefits are not subject to equitable distribution in divorce proceedings for other citizens, he contended.
The trial court disagreed and instead provided for equal distribution of the husband's pension benefits, with the wife's portion to be reduced by one-half of her Social Security benefits once she began to receive them.
The Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed the distribution and rejected the husband's argument. He could not and should not be treated like those who receive Social Security benefits because he voluntarily chose to opt out of the Social Security system, the court declared. In return for that relinquishment, he had less money deducted from his paychecks and he earned increased pension benefits. He could not now reasonably expect a court to treat him as part of a group to which he did not belong simply because the voluntary decision he made some time ago no longer benefited him, the court said.
The court found Cornbleth v. Cornbleth, 397 Pa. Super. 421, 580 A.2d 369 (1990), inapposite. In Cornbleth, the court noted, the husband and wife had equal retirement pensions, but the wife was also eligible to receive Social Security, whereas the husband was ineligible for Social Security because he participated in the federal civil service retirement system in lieu of Social Security. Therefore, the wife's receipt of Social Security benefits upset the equitable balance of marital assets, and the court had to discount the husband's pension to restore that balance.
Therefore, Cornbleth does not mean that hypothetical Social Security benefits must be deducted from the pension of a spouse who does not participate in Social Security, the court said. Instead, Cornbleth simply permits Social Security benefits to be considered, although not actually divided, if this consideration helps achieve a more equitable distribution. Cornbleth has been characterized in that way, and distinguished on its facts, by other appellate courts in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, the court added.
Here, the court noted, discounting the husband's pension for hypothetical Social Security benefits would result in an inequitable distribution. The wife had no equivalent retirement pension and could expect only a relatively insignificant Social Security benefit upon her retirement. Moreover, she was much younger than the husband, so her benefits would commence much later. Considering these points, it was proper for the trial court to award the wife a portion of the benefits that the husband now tried to disguise as hypothetical Social Security benefits, the court concluded.
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