New Jersey Divorce Lawyers Blog
In addition to calculating each parent’s child support obligation the cost of providing health insurance for the parties’ children has to be calculated, and allocated between the parties. There are two ways to calculate the health care premium for the children. The first is to calculate the actual marginal cost of covering the children. The second is to calculate the per capita cost of covering the children.
Actual Marginal Cost of Health Care Coverage for Children
If the parent paying for the children’s health insurance knows how much they are paying weekly to cover the children then that amount is placed on the child support worksheet as a weekly amount and allocated between the parties in proportion to the combined parental income. However, usually, the cost of providing healthcare is broken down in the following choices: Employee, Employee and Spouse, Employee and Family. To sort out how much of the total health insurance premium is solely for the children’s coverage requires the employee to subtract the amount paid to cover themselves, or themselves and their spouse alone from the cost paid to cover them and their children. The difference is the actual cost to cover the children. For example, if the employee’s cost to cover themselves and their spouse and children is $800 per month, and the cost to cover the employee and their spouse is $500, then the cost to cover the children is $300 per month. Continue reading →