Why should I, after having spent all this time and effort to attain whatever wealth I have attained, give it away to a bunch of people I don't know?
Generally speaking, for the greater good. I seem to recall a post a week or two ago that linked to another article about the charity of some of the wealthiest people in the world. I'm glad to see their charity has not affected your egocentric captialist views.
Not really the point, though, is it? Specifically, we're talking about distributing wealth between two partners (remember that word, we'll use it again later)when they break up. In that instance the wealth should be divided reasonably. I would generally agree that the person responsible for the breakup should not receive as much as the, for want of a better term, "injured party". There should, however, be ground rules for how much is appropriate.
In the context of the article and in any divorce court in the country, that's exactly what it is. If it wasn't, there wouldn't be divorce courts or laws which determine who gets what.
Most contracts have very well spelled out terms of what is expected of the signing parties. Marriage doesn't really have these terms. Perhaps it would be better if we simply defined these better than "to love, honor and cherish, till death we do part".
Think of a marriage as a company with two employees. Now assume that the company dissolves for whatever reason and both employees had performed their duties equally well during the life of the company. Why should one employee have to pay another once the company is defunct?
That would be a partnership. Generally, if one partner wants to leave a partnership, he/she needs to be bought out by the other or find someone else to buy out his/her share. This is pretty much the way it is regardless of why the partnership is being dissolved, except in cases where one of the partners has committed a crime, usually in relation to the partnership (ie embezzlement, insider trading, etc.) Obviously, adultery would fall into this sort of category, though there are rarely criminal penalties for adultery anymore.
If a successful partnership ends with a mutual agreement between the partners, then the assests, if any, are usually liquified and distributed evenly. Your description is more like a sole-proprietorship with a single employee. And, even in that case, the employee is often entitled to a severance package. If your employer laid you off tomorrow, wouldn't you want compensation?
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