The correct answer was found after taking with an agent over telephone. It has nothing to do with lower income of one spouse.
The CD version of TurboTax does not allow this, for no obvious reason. It seems to have been built this way and Intuit doesn't care enough about this issue to have it fixed. Judging my older posts, this issue has been going for a long tine.
The Web version allows the user to distribute the credits to the desired parent. It just works the way the CD version should work.
I asked for a refund of the CD installation, on the grounds of not being able to do what the online version does. Buyer beware!
