Why More Men Than Ever View Marriage as a Bad Deal

Over the last few decades, we’ve seen a revolutionary change in the way marriage works in America.

In your great-grandparents’ heyday, relationships were more about raising a family and making a living than love. That doesn’t mean there wasn’t any love involved; it just means the motivations were often a little different than they are today. Women wanted to get out from under the same roof as their parents and have kids. When a woman found a decent man who treated her well and seemed like he could provide for her and her children, that was often enough of a foundation to build a marriage. After all, the country was much poorer then, so her parents couldn’t necessarily support her and she didn’t have a lot of job options. A husband was the best financial option most women had back then.

Today, most women can take care of themselves and those who can’t have the federal government helping them, so they don’t NEED a man to take care of them financially. Combine this with the fact that financial opportunities for uneducated and unskilled men are dramatically reduced from the pre-shipping container/pre-computer age and marriage has been forever changed. That male dockworker can no longer support a family by himself and even if the wealthier, more educated female executive were to marry him (and she probably wouldn’t because he has less status than she does), the marriage would be far less stable because financial need wouldn’t hold them together.

This has a lot to do with why divorce happened much less frequently in the past. Not only was it a little scandalous to get divorced, a woman had a lot more worries about how to pay her bills if she decided to go her own way. That combination of financial need and social stigma held people together. Consider that “the 1967 crude (divorce) rate was 8.7 times as large as that for 1867” and it becomes obvious that marriage was a much more certain bet for previous generations of Americans.

As the need for financial security has fallen away, “love” has become the primary motivator of people who want to marry. The problem with that is that love can be one fickle b*tch.

For most people, that hot, passionate love driven by hormones that makes you crazy for someone else typically doesn’t last forever. Additionally, as people say, “familiarity breeds contempt.” When a woman is on year three of sex with the same person, she just picked his stained underwear off the floor again and what she thought were cute little idiosyncrasies early on have started to get on her nerves, “love” has turned out to be a much less effective cement than financial necessity. That’s very important because almost 70 percent of the time the woman is the one who files for divorce.

Given that we have a justice system that rewards women and punishes men at every opportunity during and after a divorce, it’s no surprise that women are more likely to be the ones ending the marriage. Courts heavily side with women over men when it comes to custody of the children. Chances are if you’re a man in a battle for custody, you’re going to lose and then you’re going to be forced to pay through the nose for the privilege of not getting to spend as much time with your kids as you like. Speaking of which, financially, the courts still act as if we’re in the thirties. Certainly, there could be a situation where a significant alimony payment would be the only fair solution, but that should be a fairly rare occurrence in this day and age.

Imagine a secretary who makes $30,000 a year who marries a CEO making 10 million dollars a year. Five years later, they get divorced. How much does she deserve? Most women would say “half.” At least “half” of what he made while they were together. The honest answer a lot of men would give you would be “nothing.” You know how much she contributed to the man’s success in his career? Nothing of significance. How much is she worth in the working world after the marriage? About the same as she was before, plus she’s had the advantage of having her much richer husband buy her things for years that she’ll take with her. Do you know what he should owe her in that situation after five years of marriage that didn’t work out in the end? Nothing, just like she owes him. Yet and still, in many states, her husband would be expected to keep her living in the “style to which she has become accustomed.” This is exactly the reason that any MAN WHO ALREADY HAS MONEY is crazy if he doesn’t insist on a prenuptial contract before a wedding. Is that romantic? No, but neither is giving a woman who hates your guts half your money. Does it imply you’re not 100 percent sure the marriage will last? Yes, it does, but in a world where divorce is so common, no one can really be sure a marriage will last anymore. You can claim otherwise if you like, but you’re just whistling past the graveyard. I’ve known women who divorced a husband because he lost his job and had trouble finding another one; because she wanted to relive her party years at 35 years old with two kids; because she decided her husband wasn’t manly enough; it goes on and on and on. What I am telling you is that there are no guarantees and your sweet, reasonable honey who loves you to death may decide she wants out of the marriage and turn into a monster once she has a lawyer whispering in her ear during the divorce. Guess what? Usually, the guy never sees it coming.

This can lead to a situation where you’re paying for the lifestyle of a woman who doesn’t want to be with you anymore and is using your kids as a weapon against you while you struggle financially. I know more than one man who has been in this situation. Almost every man does these days. Some people would tell you that’s just the price of marriage. “Hey, if she’s not worth that, then don’t get married.” But how often does the opposite situation happen? How often is a woman stuck paying the bills for her ex-husband while he has the kids after he decided he “just wasn’t in love” anymore? I’ve never heard of a situation like that, although I’m sure it has probably happened. This is an enormous risk that marriage entails for men, but generally not for women.

You also can’t underestimate the impact of having reliable female birth control and women pursuing their careers. Between college and many women trying to climb the career ladder, marriages are occurring later than ever. There was a time in American history when 80% of people were married by 21. That is no longer true.

Barely half of all adults in the United States—a record low—are currently married, and the median age at first marriage has never been higher for brides (26.5 years) and grooms (28.7), according to a new Pew Research Center analysis of U.S. Census data. In 1960, 72% of all adults ages 18 and older were married; today just 51% are. If current trends continue, the share of adults who are currently married will drop to below half within a few years.

The longer you wait to get married, the less of a chance there is that the marriage will produce children. Take the potential of having children out of the equation and marriage is even less appealing to many men. Keep in mind that single women can now easily avoid pregnancy and have become much more promiscuous than they used to be. Does that mean every single guy is getting laid left and right? Not at all, but it does mean that sex is much more available to the average single man than it was 100 years ago. In other words, even if a man never gets married, he doesn’t have to forego sex. In fact, he has the opportunity to have sex with multiple women, an attractive proposition to most men that would be denied to him if he were married. On top of that, he doesn’t have to take on any burdens. He’s not financially responsible for his girlfriend. He doesn’t have to take care of the kid she had with another guy five years ago. There’s no potential for a brutal divorce if things don’t work out. Typically, women are the ones who grew up dreaming of the perfect wedding and the commitment that followed. Most men just grew up dreaming of having sex with beautiful women.

At one time, those two fantasies had to merge. When our society was less promiscuous, the man needed to get married to have regular access to sex. He got what he wanted and she got what she wanted. Is that still true today? The numbers say “No.”

Back in the early 1990s, the average American had sex about 60 to 62 times per year, but that number dropped to less than 53 times per year by 2014. Among married couples specifically, the drop was even more dramatic - from about 73 times per year in 1990 to 55 in 2014. This actually brings the sex lives of married couples below people who've never been married, who have sex about 59 times per year as of 2014. So if you’re a man, getting married may very well mean LESS SEX and with the same woman instead of potentially sleeping with multiple women. It also means risking a soul-ripping divorce where the court system will be stacked against you. Oh, and don’t even mention the old, “Getting married? Wow, I’ll be treated like a king!” fantasy that men had once. Today, you’re more likely to be treated to demands that you do half the weekly housework.

When you look at that sort of thing, it’s easy to understand why some men are simply opposed to marriage. I am not one of those men, but I will tell you the scales have tipped too far against men in marriage. By that, I mean that unless something changes that shifts the institution of marriage back onto more favorable ground for men, marriage will have great difficulty recovering in America. Since marriage is one of the most important building blocks of a successful society, that’s something none of us should want.

By choosing your spouse wisely.

I find it hard to believe that any man could find absolutely no sign of a woman’s selfishness or shallowness prior to proposing to her. If he is an unselfish and attentive husband, why would a decent woman suddenly become hateful and selfish?

I’ve seen plenty of men ignore obvious character flaws in the pretty women they choose to marry. There are gentle, faithful women who are overlooked by men because they aren’t flashy or attention seeking.

Women who are sincere followers of Christ will submit to their husbands because they already have the mindset of submitting their will to Christ. But I suppose they come off as boring to most men. I’m sure I did.

What’s funny is that the faithful love of my husband brought out the best in me. I’ve had strangers compliment me and that just makes me giggle because I’ve been married for almost 20 years and we have six children. I didn’t get as much attention at my “peak” in my college years.

“This has a lot to do with why divorce happened much less frequently in the past.”

More nonsense. The majority morals changed, that’s what caused the increase in divorce, not the “jobs” changes. Millions of good people have navigated the changing jobs scene, gotten married and stayed married, without divorce. They kept their morals intact.

“I’m too old to take a stand on this, I guess, but I got married in 1972, at the height of the “hippie days”, and we were a hippie couple for sure. I don’t want to go into detail, as it gets kind of personal, but we got married, stayed married, had kids, had grandkids, and here we are.”

I KNEW IT!!! If there was one hippie couple that survived long term, they’d be on FreeRepublic! (I’ve spent 30 years trying to find that couple)

Congratulations!!!

“The average dock worker today earns $147,000 a year. In other words, enough to raise a family and have a wife almost anywhere n the country.”

I was thinking just the same. I guess the guy never met a dockworker in the Northeast.

And even with what they make, FDR had to bribe their leaders to support the WW2 war effort, as the dockworkers wanted a bigger ‘piece of the action’ before they’d load cargo.

Thanks for posting fascinating and factual history of the destruction of the nuclear family in America. There is no putting that genii back in the bottle.

Women no longer need men in any way, shape or form. They can literally go from cradle to grave without a man and do quite well for themselves in the current paper-pushing FIRE economy where constantly dying manufacturing trades are more automated than ever, whereas they needed a man for financial security and protection in a former world where often might made right.

No more. Marriage is becoming obsolete. The destruction of the nuclear family in America is almost complete and that will be the destruction of our society and culture. America will decline, fall, and be nothing when that is complete.

May the Lord God have mercy on us.

You are an excellent example of what Americans used to be, what American culture used to be. The America you grew up in and got married in, is long dead and gone. It is not even close to the same anymore.

You were lucky to be born in the 1950s as am I lucky.

It is very doubtful you would ever get to a 45th wedding anniversary if you were born today. Extremely doubtful. And very likely you would not get married at all.

That might be hard for you to imagine due to the era we grew up in but that is today’s reality. We were very lucky to be born into an era before the rapid decline and destruction of the common nuclear father, mother, children family.

I beg to differ. A good marriage is still as good as ever. It is just that bad and short marriages are becoming the norm. There are still good people who find each other and marry and will stay married. Human nature never changes. Just culture changes.

But you are not entirely wrong. I would say most new marriage today are a horrible deal for most men. They won’t last and the man will get the raw end of the deal. The thing is, the women lose as well.

It is a nice perk for 2 people earning money in the work place to pay 1 mortgage or 1 rent bill, 1 TV bill, 1 internet bill, etc. All those common goods and services that a couple can share really go a long way toward economizing life. When they divorce, they both lose, just the man tends to lose bigger than the woman.

FR feminists seem to be astoundingly few and far between. The ladies here tend to be very intelligent and not the emotion governed dingbats that dominate liberalism. There are only a small handful here that go off the handle.

Otherwise, any thread bashing women with a broad brush is going to get, and deserves, some rational push back from the FR ladies. As would any anti-male bashing thread from the men.

For the most part, the ladies here realize we are just spouting off from frustration or angst, and let us have our little anti-women tantrums. At the end of the day, they know we love and worship women and put them on a pedestal.

Seems like there is a bunch of us who’ve been burned by marriage showing up on these threads. I feel bad for all of you.

Agreed.

However, sharing such experiences with younger men is very helpful in surviving these family tragedies.

Men today are raised with a largely female oriented view of marriage. It is usually only later, through bitter experience, that they learn this view is the female “best case,” not something they are actually prepared or willing to produce.

“This...I lost my two sons, 400k, half my property, and my kayak to a narcissist wife. Young men-screw marriage even to a non narc wife. Kids are wonderful and our reason to be but the wife and courts hold them as implements of extortion......”

Man, that sucks. If you got to keep the kayak but she got everything else, at least it would have been a fair deal.

Excellent reminder of an aspect the article missed, but alluded to in the divorce rates.

No-fault divorce.
Prior to no-fault divorce, the marriage contract was BINDING. People needed a compelling reason for a judge to allow breaking that contract, such as abandonment or cheating. Now it is just “I don’t love you anymore”, or the old irreconcilable differences.

What that does is allow for tire-kicking by women, especially where they earn less than the husband. It gives them an opportunity to marry a guy on a trial basis and if it doesn’t work out, they can get out instantly with some alimony to boot. Especially since so many people now “plan children” and want to enjoy a few years of childless marriage together before having them.

Precisely.

The godless communist left has done a perfect job destroying the FOUNDATION of American culture and society - by destroying the nuclear family. That destruction was intentional and was necessary to destroy America.

The God blessed man, woman, children nuclear family was the foundation upon which all American society rested, like a 100 story skyscraper built on a solid pile foundation. Now we are like a 100 story building on a bad foundation. It is not a question of if the building collapses, but when.

It was not on my watch that the godless communist liberal left destroyed the nuclear family, so who is to blame here? Somebody was asleep at the wheel and future generations of Americans will suffer for it.

I would not want to be born into America today for all the tea in China. I am not saying young people cannot be happy or have a fulfilling life. I am just saying for the life I have had being born in the 50s when we were still free and reasonably moral, I could not suffer what it is to come. I would have to slit my wrists.

“Seems like there is a bunch of us who’ve been burned by marriage showing up on these threads. I feel bad for all of you.”

I got burned pretty badly in my first marriage. I ended up paying child support and alimony, even though she was the one screwing around.

She remarried a year after the divorce. I went to court to get the alimony stopped but the judge refused to because SHE had to petition to stop it. How whacked is that?
I paid alimony for another six years until they were audited by the IRS. That somehow got the alimony stopped. By that time a different judge was hearing the case and ordered their tax refunds diverted to me until the overpayments were returned to me. I got every penny of their tax returns for eight years. Small justice for the years I went broke.

The ex would take me to court every time something happened.
I remarried, back to court.
She heard my wife was pregnant, back to court.
Our boys were born, back to court.
She had a fight with her husband, back to court.
And I had to pay her attorney fees every time.
The last time she had me in court five times in two and a half months.
The judge had finally had enough and told her not to come back.

My second wife was an angel through the whole mess. She NEVER wavered and stood with me through it all.
She gave me the best thirty years of my life.

There are men out there who treat their wives like disposable servants and some who leach off women. I’ve known both types.

I knew a beautiful gal that got pregnant her senior year. Very rare at the time.
She married the guy and they ended up with two kids.
The problem was he never grew up.
They made good money but he spent a lot of it on his hobbies; hunting, fishing and drinking.
As soon as the kids were grown she divorced him.

You’re not the only lady that drew the short end of the stick.

The article is talking about men getting married today, not about marriages 30 years ago when people tended to stay together a lot longer and work things out, rather than divorce at the drop of a hat.

I would LOVE to see some stats on the longevity of marriages among the children of divorce.

My generation of my family has almost no divorce while ALL our parents divorced at least once.

OK, you answered my questions. You are at least 50 years old and born in the 1960s with a very different experience of marriage than today. Your values and those of your wife were forged in a nuclear family very different from children growing up today. Divorced men dating today have a very different experience than you had dating your wife 30 years ago.

So while your good marriage is wonderful it is also not terribly uncommon among people born in the 1960s. That you were born in an era that made marriage generally workable for men does not speak to the current era. So thanks for playing, but your experience is way out of date to be speaking to marriages today.

Congratulations on your good marriage. That is not terribly uncommon for people born in the 1950s or 1960s. Those born in the 1980s or early 1990s have a completely different experience than you had. Those divorcing and dating today have a completely different experience than you had. Your wonderful marriage does not mean that marriage TODAY is generally a good deal for men. It is not, today.

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