“The pension is my money; let’s each cover our own living expenses” ... Husband tells wife, who spent 35 years running the household, he wants to “graduate from marriage” [What do you think?]

[Financial News] A story has emerged of a husband who, after retiring at the mandatory retirement age, unilaterally told his wife—a full-time homemaker in her 60s who had spent 35 years solely caring for the household and raising their children—that he wanted to “graduate from marriage,” then stopped paying living expenses.
On the 14th, YTN Radio’s “Attorney Jo In-seop’s Counseling Center” featured the story of a 62-year-old woman, identified as Ms. A, who was considering divorce after her husband unilaterally declared he wanted a “marriage graduation” and cut off her living expenses.
Ms. A quit her job when she got married and spent the next 35 years raising their two children and caring for the household as a full-time homemaker. Her husband worked as a middle school teacher and recently retired upon reaching the mandatory retirement age. While he was still working, Ms. A had managed the household finances, but tensions began when her husband retired.
As her husband began spending more time at home, he started interfering in every aspect of the housework and declared that he would take charge of managing the money himself. He even bought large quantities of ingredients on clearance and then complained about the taste of the food, while giving her only 500,000 won a month for living expenses and demanding receipts as proof of how it was spent.
After both children had moved out, tensions between the couple deepened. The husband, who was from the provinces, wanted to move back to his hometown, but when Ms. A, who had lived in a city all her life, refused, he unilaterally proposed a “marriage graduation.” Saying, “Divorce would be embarrassing in the eyes of others, so let’s graduate from marriage,” he soon left on his own for a country house in the countryside.
As he left, the husband said, “The pension is money I earned by working my whole life, so I can’t give you any of it. Let’s each take care of our own living expenses,” and stopped paying them altogether. To make matters worse, when Ms. A heard that he was often spending time with a woman he had met at gatherings in his village, she sought legal advice.
Kwak Dong-ju, a lawyer at Shinsegyero Law Firm, said that “a ‘marriage graduation’ is not a legal institution; legally, it is merely a ‘separation’ in which the spouses live apart while remaining married.” As long as the marriage remains intact, the legal duties of support and cooperation continue to apply, so the husband has no right to unilaterally cut off her living expenses, the lawyer explained.
Lawyer Kwak advised, “If her husband has pension income but has cut off her living expenses, she can seek support payments from the family court,” adding, “As a rule, past support payments are recognized only for the period after the claim is filed, so she should begin the claims process as soon as possible.” If the husband still does not pay after the court rules on support, she can apply for an enforcement order or seek compulsory execution against the account into which his pension is paid.
The lawyer also said the husband could be held legally liable over the suspected infidelity. Kwak explained, “If the marital relationship has in fact completely broken down, a relationship with a third party may not be recognized as an unlawful act. But this case is closer to the husband’s unilateral departure, and the separation has been brief,” adding, “His romantic involvement is likely to be judged an act of marital infidelity, and she could also consider seeking damages for emotional distress from the other woman.”
Kwak also stressed that if the couple does divorce, the husband’s civil-service pension would be subject to division as well. “Under Supreme Court precedent, it is possible to claim a share of the future payments from a retirement pension that is already being paid,” the lawyer said, adding, “The wife’s contribution, having handled the housework and childcare for 35 years, would be sufficiently recognized, so the husband’s argument that ‘the pension is my money’ is unlikely to hold up legally.”
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