Marriage: what's in it for modern men?
February 01, 2008
10 comments
Sort of as a follow up to yesterday's post on marriage, it's time to be blunt and talk about the benefits and costs to young modern men that come from getting married. Women still expect men to marry them, so let's take an honest look at the good, the bad and the ugly for men that might be keeping them from "committing."
What they can often easily get without marriage:
- Sex
- Companionship
- Children
- Live together to lower living expenses.
What they stand to gain from marriage:
- A semblance of legitimacy from a society that really doesn't tend to care much how they live their personal lives, so long as they are productive, non-criminals.
- Some tax benefits
What they stand to lose from marriage:
- Control over their financial assets.
- The ability to have a relationship with a woman who loves them and will have sex with them if their current significant other changes her mind.
- A costly divorce, one which may be fought against them with their own money.
- Respectability if they get divorced because that is an expensive way to admit failure.
Right or wrong, the fact is that most modern young men can easily get whatever they want from women today. They can have the entire married life without the marriage if they so choose, and they can do so without the danger of their significant other having legal recourse against them in many cases.
If women like Kay Hymowitz want to complain about the unwillingness of men to marry without looking like the embodiment of the stereotyped hypocritical, selfish woman who expects men to give, give, give without much behavior modification on her part, they need to actually examine the costs versus the benefits for men. That they won't usually do so is no small part of why this problem exists today.
The only real reason for men to marry today is for religious reasons, and they must make sure that they are marrying a religious woman who views marriage as a religious institution that is sacred, and not subject to her feelings of empowerment and fulfillment. For the men who are so inclined, there are still a number of marriage-minded, religious women out there to be marry. However, for most men, the facts are clear: it makes no sense to take on danger that doesn't need to be shouldered, when all you are risking is the dissatisfaction of a woman who'd be likely to divorce you within twenty years anyway if she got her way.
If I weren't a Christian, I never would have married. From a secular viewpoint, it's just not worth the risk for the man. Unless of course Jessica Alba is involved. In that case...
Mike,
I would add to your list of benefits the following:
x A longer average life span
x A stronger assurance of having at least a modicum of access to your children in the event of a separation, as compared to the access that unmarried men are afforded, which asyptotically approaches zero
x More better safer intercourse
x Higher earnings, but that has it's downside too
I would add the following to the list of costs:
x Markedly increased mortality and decreased health in the event of a divorce or separation
x Markedly less liberty in the event of a divorce or separation
x Conversion to visitor/banker status
x Nearly automatic loss of your children
x Markedly increased risk of incarceration
Other than that, you and I pretty much agree (see here and here)
Mike, what do I need to do to avoid my comments being moderated? Don't link?
The problem is that you are posting more than two links. Spammers frequently post more than that in the body of the comment, which is why my spam filter moderates your comments. It doesn't get flagged as spam because you have legitimate information, and have posted here before.
I wasn't a Christian when I got married. I got her "in trouble" and even though I wasn't raised Christian I was raised to be personally responsible for what I do. 20 years later I can say that it's the second best decision I ever made (right after accepting Jesus Christ as my savior).
One thing that men get from being married is the commitment that you get from having a legally binding relationship. It keeps us honest, or at least it should, and responsibility is a great motivator when I'm feeling lazy.
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Under disadvantages of marriage I'd add the very real phenomenon of sexless marriages. Someone once called marriage "a gateway to celibacy" and that's actually pretty accurate. Just talk to men who have been married more than 10 years.
As to lifespan and income, keep in mind that the direction of causality is not "marriage->lifespan + income". Death rates for men are based on age cohorts born in the 1920s and 1930s. For that generation, only the crippled, very ill, or very ugly did not marry. It was just "what was done" by ordinary guys, without a lot of thought. So, on average, those of normal or better health born in the 1920s/30s became married, and the very sickly did not. Always remember, correlation != causation.
It's similar to owning a Jaguar car. If you buy a Jaguar, it doesn't make you wealthy. Rather, there's a correlation between wealthier people (wealth came first) owning Jaguars.
Under Obama, marriage takes on new costs or benefits, namely the enhanced marriage penalty. The people now dubbed "rich" by virtue of their well-paying jobs may be penalized even more for being married. My wife and I are considering divorce or legal separation solely to reduce our tax burden. Together, we are subject to Obama's soak the rich tax regime, and if Rangel gets his way, an additional 4% tax surcharge on gross income. Further, we get no deductions or exemptions due to phaseouts. But if we separate or divorce, we can file separately and our incomes are under the threshold for the new soak-the-rich taxes. Further, we lose less of our deductions due to phaseout, and may actually be able to enhance our pre-tax income opportunities.
We have to run the numbers to see if the savings are worthwhile, but I predict that you will see a lot of legal separations in 2010, particularly in HNW areas.
I was taken back a bit when she proposed this, but as a tax attorney, I had always maintained that we paid more for being married and Obama simply makes that worse, so I suppose I had it coming. And her point was that so many of the incidents of marriage are easily replaced, and you don't need state recognition to be in a relationship. Marriage is already out with upper classes (easier to ditch a golddigger girlfriend than a golddigger wife), and with Obama making marriage more expensive for HENRYs, being single may be a status symbol in the future, and only poor or middle class folks will get married.
Women only see what they can get from men through marriage. I wouldn't advise any man to marry as all its benefits can be obtained in other places without it. These days women don't know what they want and they are very irresponsible and selfish. Who says children only need their mom? Don't expect to get the rich family experience you had in the family you were raised marrying a modern woman.