Matrimonial

Considering an expert: whether earning capacity is genuinely in dispute

The considering stage decides whether the case turns on imputation. Where one spouse has been out of the workforce for years, where a spouse's reported income is claimed to understate what they could earn, where a spouse claims a disability that limits work, or where a child's care needs are said to keep a parent home, the court will be asked to attribute an earning capacity, and that attribution is the court's determination, informed by evidence. A vocational evaluation supplies that evidence; where the parties agree on what each can earn, it adds little. Counsel reads the education and employment history, the current earnings and any medical claim, and decides whether an independent opinion will change the support calculation.

Timing follows the family court's calendar. An evaluation retained after temporary support is set can still address permanent support, but one retained before the first hearing serves both.

Retaining: scope, the spouse to be evaluated and the local market

Retention states whose earning capacity is to be evaluated and on what question: current employability, the earnings a documented skill set supports, the timeline and retraining needed to re-enter after an interruption, or the effect of a claimed disability on work. The records are the educational record, the employment and wage history, current earnings documentation and any prior vocational or medical testing, and the engagement should fix the geographic labor market the opinion will address. KWVRS evaluations in family matters rest on the same interview, testing and labor market methods as any other vocational evaluation, reported in the terms a family court uses, and the report states plainly that the imputation decision belongs to the court.

Counsel on either side should also tell the expert at retention whether an opposing evaluation exists, because a rebuttal engagement is scoped differently from an original one.

Preparing for deposition: the capacity figure and the re-entry timeline

Deposition in a support matter presses on two numbers: the earning capacity figure and the time to reach it. The expert prepares to explain how the education, skills and work history were assembled into a set of occupations, what wage evidence supports the figure for each in the relevant market, and how a re-entry timeline or retraining requirement was derived where the spouse has been out of work. Where a disability is claimed, the expert explains which restrictions were adopted from the medical record and how they narrowed the occupations. The expert should be ready to address the other spouse's position on the same facts, because the evaluation is neutral as to who retained it.

Rebuttal preparation, where the engagement is a rebuttal, concentrates on the points of difference in data, assumption and method between the two reports.

Trial: an opinion for a family court judge

Matrimonial testimony is usually given to a judge rather than a jury, and it is presented accordingly: the occupations identified, the wage evidence, the timeline and the assumptions, stated in the support terminology the court applies and without advocacy for either party. The expert offers an earning capacity opinion and leaves the imputation, and the support that follows from it, to the court. Consistency with the report and any deposition is checked in the preparation session, and counsel confirms the governing standard for imputation in the jurisdiction so that the testimony is framed in its terms.