Our Marriage Waited 20 Years for Full Financial Benefits: A 1995 Story

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• Once our California wedding was recognized at the federal level in 2015, we were able to file our taxes together for the first time.
• Getting married has enabled us to pool our health insurance benefits.
• Having the legal right to marry ensures our spousal property rights, which provides me with financial security.

It has been nearly a decade since the federal government officially acknowledged my marriage, and it’s simple to grow indifferent and lose sight of how things were prior to this recognition.

Nevertheless, it's crucial to keep in mind everything I have acquired. In 2022, the conservative-dominated Supreme Court indicated its readiness to take away the right for same-sex couples to marry . Here are just a few of the many financial advantages of being married that are still at stake.

Filing a joint tax return

From when my partner and I decided to get "married" in 1995 — we jumped over a broom because we had no way to legally marry at that time — checking the box for "single" on tax returns felt like a demeaning lie, but we had no choice because the government didn't recognize our marriage.

In 2008, the California Supreme Court made same-sex marriage legal, so we got officially married in our home state. Nonetheless, our journey was far from over.

In November 2008, Proposition 8 was approved, which made same-sex marriages unlawful once more within the state of California. This change significantly complicated our tax situation. While we were able to submit joint tax returns at the state level, the federal government continued to treat us as individuals for taxation purposes. As such, our tax preparer needed to balance these discrepancies across both filings, leading to additional expenses for preparing our taxes.

In 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court made same-sex marriage legal across the country, which was when my spouse and I began to fully enjoy the advantages of being married.

The majority of wedded partners put aside funds. filing taxes jointly , and that's certainly been true for my wife and me. We saved on taxes when she returned to school while I was working. We saved when I made a career change, and my earnings dipped for a while.

Best of all, we can check the "married" box on our tax returns and every other form.

Pre-tax insurance

I currently get my health insurance through my wife's work, and the amount is taken out before tax. That means she doesn't pay income tax on the cost of my health insurance, saving us the taxes on about $12,000 a year.

Before we were legally married, my wife had health insurance through her job, but she wasn't able to add me to the policy. The insurer could choose whether to recognize same-sex spouses, and it chose not to. I couldn't afford insurance at that time, so I was uninsured. By the time she quit her job to go to grad school, I could put her on my work insurance, but I had to pay income tax on the cost, because the federal government didn't yet recognize our marriage.

Sharing coverage advantages both our bodily well-being and financial security.

Owning property together

Back in 2004, when we purchased our condominium, we hadn’t tied the knot yet, which meant we couldn't leave everything up to the title company for handling the deed. Instead, we needed legal advice to ensure our property interest was documented in a manner that provided us with rights similar to those of a married couple—a cost not faced by wedded counterparts. Nowadays, our deed accurately represents our marital state.

In California, which operates as a community property state, assets obtained during the marriage are considered jointly owned by both partners. This encompasses not just real estate but various types of possessions too. When I was working for a lawyer assisting same-sex couples with their wills and estates prior to marriage being legally recognized nationwide, we sometimes encountered instances where bigoted family members would come in and claim everything from an apartment following the death of one partner within these unions. In such situations, lacking proper legal protections, things could get very complicated. will Many individuals lack this privilege; as such, the surviving partner previously held no entitlements to the belongings within their shared residence. Currently, marriage safeguards our claims to assets we jointly possess.

Freedom from financial fear

Following the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2015, I experienced a sense of being a complete citizen for the very first time. It wasn’t until this burden lifted that I realized the fundamental level of financial instability I had endured all along.

I enjoy the chance to live a moderately ordinary and somewhat uneventful life, irrespective of my marital status. In the future, I plan to keep enjoying the economic advantages of marriage, such as spousal retirement benefits. Social Security and my wife's pension.

However, if our rights and the acknowledgment of our marriage come under threat, I will step forward once more to fight against it.

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