Internships, and Intern Interment of Students In early 2000, the parties entered into two agreements relating to the “internship” of their son, Dimitri. Each party agreed that he would pay a portion of Dimitri’s college tuition at the University of South Alabama in Mobile, Alabama. The first agreement was for a three-year term and required the father to pay $19,700 per year to the university to support  - 3 - Dimitri. The second agreement was for a four-year term and required the father to pay $20,400 per year to the university to support Dimitri. Both agreements provided for the father to pay $50 per credit hour toward Dimitri’s educational expenses in the event that Dimitri incurred a summer session class with an internship component (internship). The agreements provided that the total amount of payments for both agreements would not exceed $35,000 for each year. The written agreements between the parties contained the following term that is relevant to this opinion: The parties agree that Dimitri’s education will be provided at the University of South Alabama. However, due to Dimitri’s minor age and high school student status, the university is not obligated to provide him with any specific educational programs and Dimitri may not enroll in any specific program or courses at any time during his attendance. Dimitri is not to be enrolled as a full-time student at the University of Alabama. The parties agree that Dimitri will continue to live in the State of Alabama and attend the schools in Mobile, Alabama. [Emphasis added.] The record includes a letter dated March 24, 2001, in which Dimitri described his enrollment in the University of South Alabama and indicated that the program required him to reside on the school’s campus for 5½ weeks during each summer vacation. The record includes an internal Revenue Service Form 1099-MISC, Miscellaneous Income, issued to Dimitri’s father and showing the payment of $20,500 to Dimitri’s father for the 2002 school year.  - 4 - The record also includes an official University of South Alabama letter from the director of the internship program stating that the program had been created in 2000 and that students were not required to live on campus during the first summer session. Respondent issued to petitioners a notice of deficiency with respect to their taxable year 2001, and petitioners filed a petition with this Court in which they disputed the deficiency. Petitioners resided in Atlanta, Georgia, at the time they filed the petition. In the petition, petitioners assert that: Taxpayers [petitioners] have never claimed the $20,500 payment by the University of South Alabama to [Dimitri] to be either income or non-taxable under IRC § 117. Taxpayers do not claim this payment to be child or alimony income. In the petition, petitioners assert that respondent incorrectly determined that the $20,500 paid to Dimitri’s father constituted nontaxable child support. At trial, petitioners conceded that the amount of $20,500 that Dimitri’s father paid to the University of South Alabama is taxable to petitioners for 2001. Discussion Under section 71(a), a husband and wife may elect to file a joint return, and their combined gross income for the taxable year shall be computed on the basis of the taxpayer’s income whether or not a joint return is filed. See sec. 6013(a).  - 5 - Under section 71(c), a child support payment shall be includible in the gross income of the recipient of the payment in the year received to the extent that it reduces the recipient’s Federal income tax liability for the year. See sec. 1.71-1T(b), Q&A-2, Temporary Income Tax Regs., 49 Fed. Reg. 34455 (Aug. 31, 1984). If the payment is properly allocable to the taxpayer and the taxpayer establishes that no part of the payment is properly allocable to the support of someone else, then that part of the payment is considered received by the taxpayer and not includible in gross income. See id. The Internal Revenue Code provides that the term “alimony or separate maintenance payment” means any payment in cash if-- (A) such payment is received by (or on behalf of) a spouse under a divorce or separation instrument, (B) the divorce or separation instrument does not designate such payment as a payment which is not includible in gross income under this section and not allowable as a deduction under section 215, (C) in the case of an individual legally separated from his spouse under a decree of divorce or of separate maintenance, the payee spouse and the payor spouse are not members of the same household at the time such payment is made, and (D) there is no liability to make any such payment for any period after the death of the payee spouse and there is no liability to make any payment (in cash or property) as a substitute for such payments after the death of the payee spouse. [Sec. 215(b).] In the case of a payment which is a qualified domestic relations order, only the portion of such payment which is properly allocable to support shall be considered as alimony or  - 6 - separate maintenance payment. See sec. 71(c)(1). In making this determination, the elements that must be met are set forth in section 71(b) and include that the amount of the payment is not likely to be modified (within the meaning of section 71(c)(2)), the divorce or separation instrument does not designate such payment as nonmodifiable, and the payor spouse is not the same individual who is designated in the instrument as the payee. If section 71(b) is satisfied, then the first applicable rule under section 71(c) shall apply. See sec. 1.71-1(b), Income Tax Regs. The first applicable rule under section 71(c) requires that an amount described in section 71(a) shall be treated as received by the payee spouse in the year when it is actually or constructively received, which ever is later. Petitioners do not dispute that section 71(a) applies to the payments made to Dimitri’s father. Payments made pursuant to a divorce decree constitute child support. See sec. 71(c). Petitioners do not dispute that the payments made pursuant to the 2001 divorce decree constituted child support. Under section 1.71-1T(b), Q&A-2, Temporary Income Tax Regs., supra, if the payments are made to a person who is not the individual who has custody of the child and the payments are made pursuant to a divorce decree, the payments are considered to be child support regardless of whether the payments are treated as alimony, spousal maintenance, or child support. See id. This is true even if the decree refers to the  - 7 - payments as alimony, as opposed to child support. See Eppes v. Eppes, 246 S.E.2d 841 (Ga. Ct. App. 1978). For purposes of the application of section 71, the term “custody” means the legal right to maintain a parental relationship to the child and shall include legal custody, physical custody, and guardianship of the child. See id. However, for purposes of section 71, custody does not include caretaking, supervision, or other temporary relief. See id. In the present case, Dimitri was under the age of 18 at the time of the parties’ divorce in 2001. See sec. 1.71-1T(b), Q&A-11, Temporary Income Tax Regs., 49 Fed. Reg. 34455 (Aug. 31, 1984). Because of his age, he was not subject to any court orders as to the physical custody or the legal custody of himself, either in 2001 or at any time thereafter, and such orders were not entered by the Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court of Mobile County, Alabama. Moreover, pursuant to the 2001 divorce decree, petitioners retained physical custody of