REASONS NOT TO MARRY

Why is marriage out of style? Author Wendy McElroy tells us:

The Rutgers report -- admittedly based on a small sample -- found ten prevalent reasons. The first three:

1) They can get sex without marriage;


2) They can enjoy "a wife" through cohabitation; and,


3) They want to avoid divorce and its financial risks.

As a critic of anti-male bias in the family courts, the reasons I hear most frequently from non-marrying men are fear of financial devastation in divorce and of losing meaningful contact with children afterward. (Such feedback is anecdotal evidence but, when you hear the same response over a period of years from several hundred different sources, it becomes prudent to listen.)

In a similar vein, the Rutgers report finds: "Many men also fear the financial consequences of divorce. They say that their financial assets are better protected if they cohabit rather than marry. They fear that an ex-wife will 'take you for all you've got' and that 'men have more to lose financially than women' from a divorce."

She offers some interesting solutions.

[Link via LRC]