States with higher marriage rates are economically healthier --> Causation/coralation or just merely flipping around of cause/effect?

2015-11-15T15:15:10+00:00

This makes a lot of sense. Single parent families are a drain on the economy of the state as the cost of Social Services is significant. And the costs associated with divorce are massive. In addition having multiple residences drains family finances so there is less money available to stimulate the economy. Plus the negative effects of divorce on children results in less success in life and therefore also drains social services resources which have to be paid by taxpayers but provides no benefit.

2015-11-15T16:50:33+00:00

Are Men Irrational For Opting Out Of Education, Careers, And Families?

I was pondering a modern parable recently [Once upon a time there was a man who had spent years working hard so that some day he could retire and go fishing. One day at the pier, he meets another man who decided to skip the years of hard work and just spend his days going fishing.]

The parable came to mind as I read a recent article in the Wall Street Journal. In “Are Boys Irrational,” James Taranto analyzes an issue brought up in an earlier article by Kay Hymowitz: why are men increasingly opting out of higher education, career advancement, and raising families? Ms. Hymowitz concluded that a lack of father figures in their lives was causing these men to act irrationally and miss out on these important parts of life. Mr. Taranto, on the other hand, suggests that these men are not necessarily behaving irrationally at all. He writes:

Except perhaps in very conservative communities, men with sufficient social skills can find sex and companionship without need of a matrimonial commitment (and for those who lack social skills, a willingness to marry is unlikely to provide much compensation). The culture’s unrelenting message–repeated in Hymowitz’s article–is that women are doing fine on their own. If a woman doesn’t need a man, there’s little reason for him to devote his life to her service. Further, in the age of no-fault divorce, “reliable husbands and fathers” not infrequently find themselves impoverished by child support and restricted by court order from spending time with their children.

As for education, the story of Joshua Strange ought to be enough to give any sensible young man second thoughts about enrolling in college. And work? Not all jobs, including those that require a college degree, are as rewarding as writing for an intellectual magazine (or, we hasten to add, a newspaper). Men traditionally sought to “better themselves” not because working in an office or on an assembly line was itself a source of delight, but because being a workingman enabled them to earn respect and made possible the joys of domestic life.

So why did this make me think of the fisherman’s tale? The point of the parable is presumably to question the wisdom of the kind of masculine ambition that leads a man to build, advance, and produce more than what he needs for himself, but the far more interesting question is this: where does this ambition come from and what is its purpose? Consider: if you think about the characters in the parable, it is not hard to guess which of the two men is more likely to be married. The businessman would certainly be a better catch in the eyes of most women, and the fisherman isn’t scaling back his hours to spend more time with a wife and kids. His highest aspiration is to simply relax and enjoy life whenever he is able. We are just speculating here, and it is certainly possible that the fictional businessman is just in it for greed, but even then, it is interesting that family is the single most likely factor to determine whether or not his ambition is truly greedy.

Mr. Taranto’s analysis of the matter is essentially that these underemployed young men are making the fisherman’s choice. Sure, sitting on the beach is replaced with casual sex and video games, but the principle is the same: for a man without ambition, the fisherman’s choice is not really irrational.

But there is a point at which the fisherman’s choice does become irrational, and it is probably this realization that has been alarming many people like Ms. Hymowitz. What makes good sense on a personal level can make less sense on a societal level. Civilization depends on the tendency of men to produce more than they consume for themselves—it depends on that masculine ambition. In the parable, the fisherman feeds himself. Following the businessman’s ambition, however, could mean feeding himself & his workers, along with any family they might have. His ambition could be a huge boon to society. Take that away, and you have a bunch of men doing what they need to do to stay comfortable, but nothing more—nothing for any women or any increasingly hypothetical children.

theQuandary · 2015-11-15T17:28:23+00:00

Warren Farrell covers this in his books (note: I'm speaking in generalities -- of course there are some number of exceptions, but they are exceptions for a reason).

Women don't work as hard as men. They don't put in the overtime (most women work less than 36.5 hours/wk), bad environments, weekends, etc. When men and women get married and have children, this problem becomes even more pronounced with women taking time off for children and men working extra hours to provide for what their family needs. It's perhaps a bit exploitive of women to make their husbands miss out on the important stuff in life, but it is economically beneficial. One last note is that women spend the vast majority of the world's money.

Based on this, the rest of the problem fits into a few categories. MGTOW (official or unofficial) don't want to play the marriage game because it's so dangerous. Most of these men are content to work easier, safer jobs for fewer hours and less money. Whether they know it or not, that's actually a smart economic move because modern socialistic wealth transfer laws make them pay for women if they earn more. In any case this reduced work and reduced spending affects the economy.

Divorces or single mother homes also have a huge impact. In cases where the father is unknown, the state has to pay for the woman's mistakes (by taking that money from male taxpayers). In cases where the father is known, the father has two reasons to work less. The first is that his children are almost always taken away from him (I'm sorry, you cannot be a father in less than 96 hours/month) which reduces his investment into them.

The second is the ridiculous and logically unsupportable ideas that 1) child support shouldn't be accounted for and 2) rich children are worth more. If child support were kept in a separate account and all transactions must be justified and potentially audited, then fathers would be much more willing to pay (and would know they are investing in their child rather than another kind of alimony). On a logical level, it's literally the only case where someone is required to give invest money via a third-party without that third-party having to justify it's malfeasance and misappropriation of funds.

Because child support in the United States is based on income, there is an impetus for fathers to reduce their income levels and go to "under the table" income to avoid paying exorbitant amount of this unaccounted for money that seldom actually benefits the child. In the state where I live, if you make 80K per year, you will pay around 200K by the time a single child turns 20. A minimum wage job doesn't bring that much in after taxes. If a person in my state had 2+ children the payout is crippling and unlivable even at what should be reasonable income levels.

The combined result of these things is that the facts are accurate, but for the wrong reason. The entire solution rests in the hands of women and lawmakers who cater to women. These issues will resolve when:

Women decide that they can contribute to the economy too
Women become the type of people men are interested in having a relationship with
Women quit filing for divorce "because they can" due to laws favoring them
Women use their political pull to change the system they setup
Lawmakers decide that men are just as important to their kids well being as women
Lawmakers decide that fixed child support rates are fair (rich kids don't cost more to raise)
Lawmakers decide that the person entrusted with a child's money must be able to account for it's use

Karissa36 · 2015-11-15T20:04:50+00:00

This is called economy of scale. Assuming two parents and children, it is obviously cheaper to pay for one residence, one set of utilities, one set of furniture and one home's maintenance, one meal for everyone, instead of dividing all those things into two. It is cheaper to have a family cell phone plan and two family cars for insurance. This is why married people are generally richer than singles, even with identical income.

scanspeak · 2015-11-15T21:32:03+00:00

It's like saying states with slavery are economically healthier.

Title	States with higher marriage rates are economically healthier --> Causation/coralation or just merely flipping around of cause/effect?
Author	eaton80
Upvotes	22
Comments	5
Date	November 15, 2015 2:00 PM UTC (10 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/3swad7/states_with_higher_marriage_rates_are/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/states-with-higher-marriage-rates-are-economically.967196 https://theredarchive.com/post/967196

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