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s/o Filial Support Laws


MinivanMom
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I had never heard of these before. I was reading up last night after clicking on some of those links, and I think my head is going to explode. I can't even wrap my mind around the idea of a child being legally forced to care for a parent who abused or abandoned them. What do you all think about this?

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My home country has that law and both my husband and I would be the last child “sued†by the courts because the only people staying in a one bedroom units in my home country would be singles, elderly empty nesters or very poor. Four people in a one bedroom unit is considered very poor. My in-laws have two empty bedrooms they could rent out for income and my MIL is working on and off at fast food chains and rejected perm offers from those fast food chains. My brother’s siblings stay in 3 bedroom + den units.

 

In my home country a guy did win an appeal to not have to support his dad who had abandoned them at a young age for other women. My cousin abandoned his kids by his first wife when they were young for his then mistress so I doubt he would sue his first wife’s kids for maintenance but he could sue his second wife’s kids for maintenance. He had visitation rights only for his first wife kids when they were young, divorce due to adultery and abandonment, and didn’t bother visiting.

 

“5.—(1) The Tribunal may make a maintenance order if it considers that it is just and equitable that the respondent should maintain the applicant and that —

(a)

the respondent is able to provide maintenance to the applicant after his own requirements and those of his spouse and his children have been supplied; and

(b)

the applicant is unable, in spite of efforts on his part, to maintain himself through work or from his property or from any other source.â€

 

ETA:

My home country law is called the MAINTENANCE OF PARENTS ACT (revised 1996).

Edited by Arcadia
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You probably hold the belief that the right thing to do to is to take care of your child.  In more than a couple of cultures, it is also the right thing to take care of your parents when they become old and unable to care for themselves. 

 

It's about taking care of those who can't take care of themselves. Adults take care of babies, and when the babies become adults, those adults take care of the elderly who took care of them (or even just took part in their conception) when they are unable to take care of themselves.

 

If your parents skipped out on their responsibility, that doesn't mean that you skip out on your responsibility and neglect to take care of them when they are unable to take care of themselves. 

 

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You probably hold the belief that the right thing to do to is to take care of your child. In more than a couple of cultures, it is also the right thing to take care of your parents when they become old and unable to care for themselves.

 

It's about taking care of those who can't take care of themselves. Adults take care of babies, and when the babies become adults, those adults take care of the elderly who took care of them (or even just took part in their conception) when they are unable to take care of themselves.

 

If your parents skipped out on their responsibility, that doesn't mean that you skip out on your responsibility and neglect to take care of them when they are unable to take care of themselves.

Nope. Taking part in my conception does not morally obligated me to take care of you when you are old. I’ll take care of my parents because they raised me but a sperm donor who skips town is entitled to zero.

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You probably hold the belief that the right thing to do to is to take care of your child. In more than a couple of cultures, it is also the right thing to take care of your parents when they become old and unable to care for themselves.

 

It's about taking care of those who can't take care of themselves. Adults take care of babies, and when the babies become adults, those adults take care of the elderly who took care of them (or even just took part in their conception) when they are unable to take care of themselves.

 

If your parents skipped out on their responsibility, that doesn't mean that you skip out on your responsibility and neglect to take care of them when they are unable to take care of themselves.

So are we legally obligated to take entire care of a parent who stopped working while in her fifties and has refused to work for the past decade? She's not elderly, she's just lazy. And she is in poverty. We do help her out by paying occasional bills directly to the person who is owed the money, but we don't give her cash. This seems like an enormous slippery slope. When does it begin? Is an adult child of say, twenty years old, since he is now an adult, obligated to care for his forty something parent for the rest of her life? I get needing to take care of ninety year old helpless grandma, just like I take care of my helpless children. But when they become no longer helpless, I expect them to do for themselves.

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The one article I read on this was out of PA, a heartbreaking story of a young women who was abandoned at ten, so it was only eight years until she reached adult hood and the slime bag parent was suing her under the statute for monthly support. She hired an attorney to defend her, but it sounded like a judge might actually order her to pay parental support because the guy was living on disability or was indigenous or low income or whatever. She was in her mind twenties. I cannot imagine!!!

 

I wonder how many abusers will sue their victims for support. If they do prison time, and come out unemployable...

 

Quite immoral if you ask me but with the corruption in our state and federal courts, I could see it happening.

 

This is what has us so concerned about mom's business bankruptcy because if the court orders her to make payments she can't afford to the bank - she only gets $1100 a month social security, no other savings - it is possible under filial laws that my sibs and I could be sued to provide the income to her to make the payments. I am hoping highly improbable but her bankruptcy attorney told us we have to get a good attorney to represent us. So there you have it. My father figure makes the most outrageous and irresponsible business decisions you can imagine, dies leaving her with the consequences, and I have to get an attorney to keep us from being financially trashed by the banks and the state of Michigan.

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It's about taking care of those who can't take care of themselves. Adults take care of babies, and when the babies become adults, those adults take care of the elderly who took care of them (or even just took part in their conception) when they are unable to take care of themselves.

 

1. All children and babies have adults to take care of them. Not all adults had children.

 

2. I didn't ask to be born, but my parents absolutely did choose to have me.

 

3. This sort of thing prevents society from building a proper social safety net to protect the elderly and vulnerable. It should not be my personal obligation to pay high medical costs for my mother, while my neighbor whose mother died, or my other neighbor with 15 siblings is spared the costs of their own parents' care. Instead, everybody in society should chip in to take care of each other.

 

4. And that's putting aside people who were abused, abandoned, or neglected by their parents.

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Michigan does not appear to have filial responsibility laws?

 

https://www.agingcare.com/articles/filial-responsibility-and-medicaid-197746.htm

They have other laws that are not called filial laws but can be used to try to force offspring to financially support parents and especially so if the parent qualifies for Medicaid, or at least this is what the lawyer has explained to us.

 

Since I was also threatened with elder abuse and neglect when I tried to refuse to care for my violent father upon his release from the psych ward narrowly avoiding a trip to jail, I have no doubt my state has zero morals on the issue and will bully adult offspring in such manner.

Edited by FaithManor
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It's like the government imposing a big fat blank check.  

I don't see how this can stand up to constitutional scrutiny.

 

Fillal support laws date back to English common law (i.e., before America was a country) and the majority of U.S. states have them on the books today.  Most of these laws require adult children (provided that they have sufficient financial means) to support dependent parents, but sometimes also siblings or even grandparents.  Like much of family law, they're not about fairness or promoting good interpersonal relationships or anything like that -- they're about keeping people off the dole.

 

There's really no federal constitutional provision that would seem on point, and indeed, courts have largely upheld the constitutionality of these filial support laws. 

 

 In recent years there have been some cases of nursing homes going after adult children to pay for their parents' care, and some people think that as the baby boomers age and public resources become strained we will see more of these.  On the other hand, these laws are very unpopular -- as evidenced by this thread -- especially as compared to public support programs like Medicare and Social Security, and one can imagine that if they became more widely enforced there would be a lot of pressure on legislators to repeal them.  

Edited by JennyD
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1. All children and babies have adults to take care of them. Not all adults had children.

 

2. I didn't ask to be born, but my parents absolutely did choose to have me.

 

3. This sort of thing prevents society from building a proper social safety net to protect the elderly and vulnerable. It should not be my personal obligation to pay high medical costs for my mother, while my neighbor whose mother died, or my other neighbor with 15 siblings is spared the costs of their own parents' care. Instead, everybody in society should chip in to take care of each other.

 

4. And that's putting aside people who were abused, abandoned, or neglected by their parents.

 

I don't think 3. is necessarily true; we require parents to support their children or pay child support to the person who is supporting their child, unless they give it up for adoption.  Giving a child up for adoption for anything other than a very serious situation is generally severely frowned upon, and yet we still manage to provide (not super well, I agree, but society does try) for abandoned children.

 

As a society, in the US anyway, we are not purely socialist.  There is a cultural expectation to care for your family before asking other people to care for them even while our wealth allows us to provide some level of care for others who are unrelated to us but live within the same political boundaries.

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