Quote:
Originally Posted by CliffFletcher
Setting any moral considerations aside, the 50s to the 80s saw the era of greatest economic egalitarianism in North America. Returning to the stark inequities of the Gilded Age, with rigid classes built on yawning disparities in education and family origins, is something to be avoided, I would think. Marriage is a bulwark against poverty, for the simple reason that we live in a society that requires two incomes to provide a family with most of the basic trappings of a secure present and a hopeful future.
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It's also an explicit legal and social arrangement that brings two families together in a joint venture.
How many of you married people had your social circle enlarged by just your spouse? You gained a second set of parents, sisters and brothers-in-law, children, spouses etc... all joined together because of one marriage.
Your responsibilities and obligations increase exponentially - economic productivity increases to meet those obligations, and your personal security is also guaranteed through a strengthened web of family connections.
Most cohabitation is an arrangement of similar intimacy, under the guide of convenience, with a predominant focus on the temporal rather than the permanent. You adopt all of the risks, and gain very few of the benefits.