Child Support and New Job

[crayiii]

Child support has not been set in my case yet.  We have a hearing sometime in Oct. for the amount to be determined.  I currently live in Southern Oregon and my wife (Divorce is not final) moved to Spokane, WA with our son.  The travel cost is a major financial hardship for excersising my parenting time.  In fact, I will be filing Chapt. 7 next week.

I am looking at moving to Spokane but the job market (in my field) is very limited there and I will need to switch fields.  I am looking at the possibility of a $30,000+ pay cut when I move.  After the chapt. 7, I will be able to live on the new salary but I'm concerned that the court will consider this being "voluntarily underemployed" and set CS based on my previous salary.

Do you have any insight on this?  Will I be punished for moving closer and having to take a lower paying job?

[dontunderstand]

We live in Spokane.  What is your employment field?  Also, I believe that they take the job market into consideration.   Also, the job market as you say is less, yet so is the cost of living.  I believe WA takes all of this into consideration.  Not certain though...

[crayiii]

fairly specialised engineering.  Portland is home and the round trip ticket to/from spokane is only $98 so I am looking there too.  The problem is about the same though with pay.  I'm getting a pretty good salary because where I'm at, no one wants to be...

[socrateaser]

>Do you have any insight on this?  Will I be punished for
>moving closer and having to take a lower paying job?

If you can prove that the only employment available is what you have been offered, then that will be the basis for your support. As for being punished, I'd say that a $30K wage cut will be punishment enough.