Marry me and save: gays and lesbians who can legally marry in May could enjoy a financial boost.

Gary Chalmers and Richard Linnell of Northbridge, Mass., celebrated their anniversary at Disneyland, cried on daughter Paige's first day of kindergarten, and watched her fret over what to wear for her first middle-school dance. But after 15 years together, they weren't considered a family by the state. The financial effect? Chalmers and Linnell spent more than $5,000 a year on insurance and legal papers that a heterosexual married couple didn't need.

These inequalities should end now that the Massachusetts supreme judicial court has ordered that gay and lesbian couples be permitted to marry beginning May 17. Those who do will enjoy financial breaks on everything from state pensions to fishing licenses--just like straight married couples. "It's every area of life and death, from matters profound to matters paltry," says Mary Bonauto, the lead attorney for Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, who argued the case on behalf of Chalmers and Linnell and six other couples.

An estimated 8,500 Massachusetts same-sex couples are expected to marry in the next few years after licenses become available to them, according to an analysis by the Institute for Gay and Lesbian Strategic Studies in Washington, D.C. Same-sex couples will be able to sue for the wrongful death of a spouse, file state income taxes jointly, and receive health care benefits, and same sex spouses of deceased state employees will be able to collect pensions. The ruling also means that gay couples qualify for additional protection against losing their houses to creditors, says John LeBlanc, a certified financial planner at Back Bay Financial Group in Boston.

After he marries Chalmers, Linnell will no longer need a separate health insurance policy that has cost $3,840 a year. He will be covered by the family policy through Chalmers' employer. If Chalmers were to die, his state-governed pension--80% of his $68,000 schoolteacher's salary--will go to Linnell. Before the marriage ruling, Linnell would have received only 10%.

Like Linnell and Chalmers, many gay married couples will save money immediately on health insurance, says M.V. Lee Badgett, associate professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Experts expect that employers who offer benefits to spouses of heterosexual employees will cover same sex spouses too. Troy Golladay and Chuck Colbert of Cambridge, Mass., will save $6,000 a year on Colbert's health insurance. "If we were legally married, [my employer] would be obligated to offer those benefits," says Golladay, a marketing manager for Hallmark Cards. Under current federal law, gay employees must pay taxes on their domestic-partner health benefits. However, similar benefits provided to married couples are not taxed by the federal government.

On the federal level, marriage gives couples at least 1,049 rights and obligations, according to the U.S. General Accounting Office. Despite changes in states' policies, the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act denies federal recognition to same-sex marriages. Gay couples won't be able to file joint federal income taxes, receive each other's pensions from most employers, or be exempt from other taxes that straight married couples can avoid. "From a standpoint of tax dollars, certainly the big tax dollars are at the federal level," says certified public accountant Larry Elkin, president of Palisades Hudson Financial Group in Scarsdale, N.Y.

Income tax rates vary by state, and no estimates were available about what the effect might be on Massachusetts income tax returns. A joint study by the Williams Project on Sexual Orientation Law at the University of California, Los Angeles, and the Institute for Gay and Lesbian Strategic Studies found that if California were to allow gay couples to file joint returns, 54% would pay less--an average of $539.

The financial benefits of marriage follow couples into death. Even if a deceased spouse lacked a will, the surviving spouse has inheritance rights. That's not so with unmarried partners. Married gay couples also will be able to pass along estates free of the Massachusetts estate tax. Gay couples still must pay the federal estate tax, which kicks in for amounts above $1.5 million. And unlike with straight couples, if one gay spouse dies, the survivor will be denied an average of $5,528 a year in Social Security benefits, according to a report by the Human Rights Campaign. "There is this real financial value to marriage that most people don't think about," says Lisa Bennett, director of HRC's FamilyNet project.

Spouses ultimately may have to go to court and fight for some benefits. "The way we find out the answer," says attorney Michael Broad, a certified financial planner in Newton, Mass., "is that somebody applies, gets turned down, and goes to court."

Henneman has written for the San Francisco Chronicle and the Los Angeles Times.