The Decline of Marriage in the United States

[Lena_Horne]

It won't be a dying breed if I have anything to do with it. Tally me as one who agrees 100% with you, Lauren.

Add another to that count, though this discussion and several others on the topic at other sites (particularly DailyKos) have been somewhat sobering. The particular person I'm thinking about wasn't against marriage but was lamenting all of the reasons why our current society has made it so difficult to stay in one. Including debt, food issues, bills, where to live, so on and so forth....It used to be so straight forward (mostly...)

L_H

 

[Samsa]

I'll echo moustache's comments - it is a shame that this happened, but my own views on how this came about are probably too controversial for inclusion here, and would threaten to hijack and thus close this thread, which I of course do not wish to do.

 

[Lady Day]

I want to get hitched one day, and if I did live with the fella, engagement would be already announced beforehand.

I like the idea of sharing life with a dedicated apartner, married or no. Im not sure if I want kids (adoption...maybe ), so the beau I end up with would have to understand that.

As far as the marriage decline, I see it as a null. In the US instant gratification is what everyone wants. The development of marriage, if people see it that way, is far from removed from what people think of it.


LD

 

[jamespowers]

I want to get married, and I always have, but I want to wait as long as it takes and make sure it's the right guy. Personally I don't want to live with a guy before I'm married- a lot of it has to do with my faith. I've also seen how hard it is for some of my friends to go through breakups when they live with their boyfriend- it's like leaving a husband and having to split up pets, furniture, belongings, etc. I like my own space while I can have it- and I know a lot of things can only be known about people when you live with them, but I'd rather chance it, know the person for at least a few years in a relationship, then have a home together after I've gotten married. I'm one of the extremely old fashioned girls that still wants to be a housewife, though- and I really think we're getting to be a dying breed of the American female.

Ding! You hit it right on the head. My wife and I figured it all out before we got married. Now she stays home with our son and provides a stable home for him. If we had to pay for all of the things she does for him and for the household it would add up to a huge sum.
A warning though, it is probably more work than an official job. You don't have to put up with a screaming child all hours of the day and night and talk about multi-tasking. :eusa_doh:

Regards to all,

J

 

[Roger]

It takes perserverance

I like to think of marriage as 50 years of headache and then you learn to adjust to each other.lol Really, we've been married for 18 years and we still get on each other's nerves. Anyone who says that marriage is all wine and roses doesn't expect nor want much from the other spouse. There will be friction. The main point is not to allow the friction to turn into frustration. Too many people want to jump ship at the first few bumps. Yeah, for first 10 years was hard; money had to re-prioritized and such. Children, homes, jobs etc. had to be juggled.

 

[Miss Dottie]

Ding! You hit it right on the head. My wife and I figured it all out before we got married. Now she stays home with our son and provides a stable home for him. If we had to pay for all of the things she does for him and for the household it would add up to a huge sum.
A warning though, it is probably more work than an official job. You don't have to put up with a screaming child all hours of the day and night and talk about multi-tasking. :eusa_doh:

Regards to all,

J

It's great if you can afford it. But raising kids is supposedly a rather expensive endeavor.

Ergo-both parents work.

 

[Elaina]

Economically it is also hard in this day and age. I may not "work" perse, but I work an at home job answering phones when my kid is at school, part time. I also sew for a fetish shop/club gear store and write in addition to going to college to help pay the way.

Without my income, we wouldn't have some of the niceties of life. no, I don't need 5 sewing machines, or that $7 a yard material. My son wouldn't be able to go to soccer without going meatless 3 times a week, and my husband wouldn't have cable TV. We make sacrifices, and would have to supplement on food stamps/welfare (which I'm not, nor ever have been). I choose my hours and we do okay. I shop well (and often!) and we are able to do things we'd like to do.

Marriage as a moral issue is fine if that's how you want to look at it. I used to be that way. I personally would never have gotten married to my husband had it not of been for several long, painful and in depth conversations about the expectations, desires and benefits of doing it. While I don't mind being married to my husband, frankly, I don't preach to my son he has to ever be married, and spend more time telling him he needs to be 30 or older before deciding that. Children involved is something different, but I personally don't ascribe to the notion that marriage is all there is. I'm thoroughly against it. Not to be confused with a committed, monogamous relationship.

Oxymoron, I realize, but bear in mind it only takes one bad experience to turn you off of anything. Think about restaurants. Do you give them a second chance when they screw up your visit?

I'm going to bow out of this conversation now, as I can become very vocal over something that left me very bitter. Look forward to reading your comments tho!

 

[DancingSweetie]

It's great if you can afford it. But raising kids is supposedly a rather expensive endeavor.

Ergo-both parents work.

I've always wanted to be able to stay home with the kids (when I was married) but we could never afford it aside from the first 3 months after having each daughter.

 

[Rosie]

Add another to that count, though this discussion and several others on the topic at other sites (particularly DailyKos) have been somewhat sobering. The particular person I'm thinking about wasn't against marriage but was lamenting all of the reasons why our current society has made it so difficult to stay in one. Including debt, food issues, bills, where to live, so on and so forth....It used to be so straight forward (mostly...)

L_H

You can add me to that list also. I'd love to get married and raise a family. The problem (at least in my opinion) is people don't see marriage as the "thing" to do anymore. I've met men in their 40s who have loudly proclaimed they aren't thinking about marriage in the least. People live together, make babies and then move on to the next person and do the same thing again. In many cases, I know people (myself included) who have been deemed weird because we are unmarried and childless. Personally, I think it's sad. Another thing I've run into, not just personal experience but from friends of mine also, are these over 21 year old children who don't have their lives together, therefore not making them the type of person a gal would want to marry. Men without horrible jobs, horrible outlook on life and general irresponsibility. I'll take single life over that any day. If in a few years, I haven't found anyone, I'll adopt and live as a single mom. Not something I think is an ideal situation but [huh] , that's where I am.

 

[jamespowers]

It's great if you can afford it. But raising kids is supposedly a rather expensive endeavor.

Ergo-both parents work.

It really doesn't take that much extra. It just depends what you expect and what you can sacrifice. I can go without a whole lot and as my wife says "he looks at you and smiles when you hold him in your arms; it is all worth it. There are some things you just aren't willing to miss." It is bad enough that I miss some of it while I am at work.
Cable TV and all that stuff is nothing if you don't have the memories later in life. I am sure there are those that are really stuck and have to do what they can to make it though. You just have to determine what you can do with what you have. We have and it works.
I just cannot imagine not being married at this point in my life. It takes two people to raise a family. My heart goes out to those who are in bad straits due to a deadbeat or someone who has moved on to something else. They miss so much and put too much pressure on one person to do it all alone.

Regards,

J

 

[Section10]

A danger to many marriages is that couples don't really fall in love; they fall in lust. And when that inevitably fades -- there's nothing left.

 

[Lena_Horne]

You can add me to that list also. I'd love to get married and raise a family. The problem (at least in my opinion) is people don't see marriage as the "thing" to do anymore. I've met men in their 40s who have loudly proclaimed they aren't thinking about marriage in the least. People live together, make babies and then move on to the next person and do the same thing again. In many cases, I know people (myself included) who have been deemed weird because we are unmarried and childless. Personally, I think it's sad. Another thing I've run into, not just personal experience but from friends of mine also, are these over 21 year old children who don't have their lives together, therefore not making them the type of person a gal would want to marry. Men without horrible jobs, horrible outlook on life and general irresponsibility. I'll take single life over that any day. If in a few years, I haven't found anyone, I'll adopt and live as a single mom. Not something I think is an ideal situation but [huh] , that's where I am.

Strangely enough, I seem to have met a short succession of intelligent, have-their-act-together (for the most part) guys. My age even (which means twenty-three or younger). It just worked out or it didn't. Lucky me.

L_H

 

[Quigley Brown]

A danger to many marriages is that couples don't really fall in love; they fall in lust. And when that inevitably fades -- there's nothing left.

Just wondering....are you a minister?

 

[LizzieMaine]

I think a real danger is the idea of being more attracted to the *idea* of marriage than to the person you end up marrying. I can look back on my own situation and see that there was a bit of that going on -- I wanted to get married so much that I jumped at the very first opportunity I had to do it, without really taking the time to figure out if this was, in fact, absolutely the right person for me. Fourteen years later, I got the answer to that question.

So, personally, I think the trend toward later marriages, toward not just jumping into matrimony in your twenties, is a good thing -- what's the saying, "Marry in haste, repent at Leisure?"

 

[Section10]

Minister?

Absolutely no way! Never have been and never will be. I'm just a poor truck driver with very little formal education. But people fascinate me and I have a fairly organized mind and I'm able to put 2 and 2 together and I usually know the difference between right and wrong.

 

[Paisley]

I think a real danger is the idea of being more attracted to the *idea* of marriage than to the person you end up marrying.

I think grandma called this being boy crazy or girl crazy. (I've been that way, too; I think most of have at some time.)

Some people can love whomever they decide to, it seems. Over the past few years, I soaked up all I could on the subject of marriage because I wanted to learn about relationships. I noticed the word "love" hardly ever came up in all the books, articles and conversations. It was more like "the art of the deal."

As an example of this, a few years ago, I had a dance partner who was so intent on getting married that I really believe he was sitting there one day at the club thinking, "I'm going after the next woman who walks through the door." The next woman happened to be me. We hardly ever made conversation, we never went out together, never were anything but dance partners. But a few months later he told me he loved me. (Kind of in the same way I love Orlando Bloom, I guess.)

 

[jamespowers]

A danger to many marriages is that couples don't really fall in love; they fall in lust. And when that inevitably fades -- there's nothing left.

I have seen dozens of such cases. The other that makes me laugh is the opposites attract thing. What they should say is that "we have nothing in common." Great basis for a lasting relationship. :eusa_doh:

Regards,

J

 

[Archie Goodwin]

Another reason

I suppose there are a lot of reasons people are waiting longer to get married: career, education, less pressure, etc. There are also people who will chose never to get married, and I am sure they have very valid reasons.

That said, I discovered yesterday a possible reason for my wife and I to get divorced. We are very happily married, we both have pretty good jobs, we have a toddler we adore, and another baby due in April. And we do not want to get divorced. I should note here that I am a CPA. I was playing around with our taxes yesterday, and I discovered that we could save $4,000 per year in Federal income taxes if we got divorced.

As for serious reasons for divorce, I do believe the birth control pill and the advancement of women in the workplace have changed society. I am in no way trying to make ethical or moral judgements, but I think it can be objectively argued that these two things have changed the dynamics of economics and reproduction.

 

[Vermifuge]

Colorado is a common-law state, but the law is more complicated than having lived together for a certain period. As I understand it, both parties have to agree that they are married, not just living together.

I say, if you want to have kids, if you want to make a life together, if you are certain you want that, get married. It's a commitment; living together isn't. It's a relationship that you and others will take more seriously than being "significant others." It's also a legal contract where you will have a lot more help from the court if things go awry.

It's ironic how couples say they don't want the State involved in their relationship, but when they break up and someone is left with the bills, whom do they turn to? The State--via the legal system.

I think the whole idea is silly. I have a roomie that has been with me 3 years now. She’s great and we get along on anything. But we are not in any way romantic. I would hate t think that marriage would be forced on people in similar situations

 

[Lena_Horne]

I'll admit that a lot of my views are colored by the fact that I grew up in an unmarried, single-parent household. Based upon my experience (which admittedly isn't the worst it possibly could have been) I wouldn't have children unless I was married. I can't do it any other way. I would rather go without then have any experience similar to mine lined up for my children.

L_H