X's girlfriend, while married 17 or 18 years and 4 kids, got NO alimony. She only gets child support, $500/week. She was a stay-at-home-mom, too. I think it had to do with him citing the adultery.
I was told that there isn't anything set in stone for alimony, just what is customary. Gyp is right about the length of marriage thing - I was married for near-16 years, and my alimony ends in 8. My child support ends as each child reaches 18. The 2 lawyers looked at both of our incomes, making sure that we could both live off the money we would each end up with, to determine the alimony amount. I had been getting $650/week unallocated (which made it all taxable to me as income - ack!) since the legal separation, an amount I came up with to pay all the bills. After the divorce, it was reduced to $300 for child support (about $40 more than the chart according to his income), and $200 alimony/week. Only the alimony will be taxable to me, now (deductible to him). Check with a tax person, too.
Your wife has a good-paying job. She left the marriage while committing adultery. I don't think she is "entitled" to any alimony at all. Alimony, traditionally, is a vehicle to make sure that mothers who stayed at home to raise the children wouldn't be left starving or forced to rush out to take a job (or two) if they were left by their husbands. It allowed them time to train and re-enter the workforce, or took that burden off of them entirely if it was a "long-term" marriage. As in, staying home to raise kids and keep house, only to have hubby take off with his 22 year-old secretary, and being 55 with no training, skills, or experience. That is certainly not your wife's case.
