[Mouton]

I made provision for my wife unlikely before me. In blended families that is important.

[pierrem15]

I think in most states the surviving spouse gets everything in the US, unless there's a will specifying otherwise. My guess is that if the husband, for example, owes something to a previous wife it might get complicated. It might also be complicated if there ae multiple children with different spouses when the second spouse goes.

In Poland, if you are married and die without a will with no children, your spouse gets the house but only 1/2 of the rest of your estate. The rest goes to your family: parents, then siblings, their children, etc.. It's probably a legacy of peasants trying to keep family farms big enough to be viable.