In California, the legislature has attempted to reduce Family Law to "black and white". This "reform" was made necessary by the extraordinary BIAS of judges in approaching the dissolution of domestic partnerships. The law attempts to limit, not just guide, judicial discretion.

The mantra for property division is each partner receives half. In divorce, each partner feels like someone just took half their stuff.

The key to equal property division is "full disclosure", policed by a fiduciary duty. Curiously, in practice, domestic partners have yet to enjoy the same fiduciary standards of duty applied in commercial partnerships, although the Family Code now invokes the same Sections of the Corporation Code, and FC 1101 provides for forfeiture of undisclosed or unfairly divided assets. In Theory.

Statistically, young children are left with their mothers to put into childcare -- so she can work to survive. The mothers are provided with temporary "support" from a man whose "lifestyle" immediately improves while his children are ground down with the mothers' poverty. For the most part, she loses her biggest asset -- her source of cash flow.

Today, most breeding couples "work" and pretend to share domestic chores. Our "community property" law goes back to Spanish colonial precedents cobbled together -- the cases read like courts of La Mancha. See DeFunis.