DOMA also brings financial harm to children of same-sex couples. It raises the cost of health care for families by taxing health benefits provided by employers to their workers’ same-sex spouses.My friend was married to his husband in a New Jersey church a few years ago. Legally, they are joined in a New Jersey civil union. My friend gets health insurance through his spouse, but thanks to DOMA, the employer does not get the federal tax exemption for providing his health insurance, and the employer passes on the cost to this couple.
When New Jersey passed its law establishing civil unions in 2006, it was billed as marriage in all but name. It was never that, and now its difference from marriage is all the more acute. An ACLU-NJ press release applauding today's decision and exhorting New Jerseyans to push for gay marriage spells this out:
Same-sex couples in civil unions will remain ineligible for the hundreds of benefits that now will be granted to same-sex married couples in other states under the court’s decision.
