Community property laws automatically gave wives half the family earnings

Evidence

The joy of many Pennsylvania husbands last week was curdled by a sober afterthought. A Green County judge had ruled that under the new law a coal miner who had deserted his wife must continue giving her half his earnings….In most states, if a husband left his wife or if a wife went home to mother, the best she could hope for was a nominal support allowance. In any community-property state, the woman automatically came out with half the family bankroll. — Dorothy A. Brown, The Whiteness of Wealth, 93

Categorization

Category: Factual Claims

• ADDENDUM: Directly parallels the marriage-penalty/bonus mechanism central to ‘Complaints About Immodesty’ — here it’s property and tax law rather than dress signaling who benefits from the inequality.