For first time, unmarried households reign in US

[shengmei]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

Bad news. My view is from a religious standpoint. I do believe in the Book of the Law (The Bible) that marriage is sanctioned and sacred to God. I feel SOME people tend to do better in life when they are committed to one another. (Some will never be committed no matter if they are single or married). Just like tithing, things just seem to work out better when one follows the principles in the Bible.

I do enjoy the benefits of marriage.

My 2 cents worth.

Same here.

Personally, through....I don't really concern myself with issues such as homosexuality. The only thing I can think of right now that concerns me is single parenthood. I don't know about most people, but I find the desperation of some single mothers somewhat scary. I hope you guys don't hate me for that.

[kimiko]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

Non-issue here too

But I expect a lot of changes though. With the increasing number of cohabiting households, there will be new laws to ensure that they receive similar benefits to married households. Secularly speaking, a marriage license does nothing except providing financial incentives. Heck, there isn't even a uniform law regarding marriage in this nation, it varies from state to state. Religiously speaking, this nation is diverse enough to have many religions with different definitions of marriage and not all of them involve a marriage license.

[kimiko]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

Speaking of family, everyone in here use DH, DD, DW, etc... to describe their family members. What's with the D?

[Broken Arrow]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

"Darling" or "Dear".

Personally, I think "Darned" is funnier.

[kimiko]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

lol, thanks

[tinapbeana]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

just to throw a wrench in this whole topic: i live in a state that recognizes 'common-law' marriage, so you can be legally recognized as married without ever actually intending to get married! some of the things in SC that constitute common-law are

1. living together
2. having both names on a bank account
3. signing into a motel room as MR and MRS whatever

DH and i qualified as common-law well before we ever actually got married. i myself was fine w/ things before, and he was the one who really wanted to get married (in his case, it's a second). those reading my blogging may be as confused about this as i am

[markio26]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

i am not surprised... thanks for posting this... i have been married for 32 years.... i am financially independent of my spouse... but, i like comfy things.. and security....

[Gruntina]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

Just my own personal idea here and not intended to make a deliberate statement.

For some reasons I get the feeling that our society's high rising crimes of violence’s and diseases such as STD or HIV are partly the consequences of uncommitted relationships, divorces, doing things outside of committed relationships, children losing identity from the consequences of their parent's choices and so on.

I see so many court cases resulting from divorces on who gets what, child custody, pets’ custody, money, and rights to the house and so on. It gets ugly. I also see so many "roommates" or "living together" on court cases or in newspapers as well. Tons of restraining orders are made out every year, betrayals and revenge going on. If you read the news, there have been occasions where one murders their spouse instead of just asking for a divorce. (Lacey comes to mind here). I know one man shot his girlfriend in SF because she cheated on him even though they were not married. What examples are we leading for our children? What are we doing to our selves? Are we to watch our own backs or work together as a team?

No wonder why people have different feelings of what we can do in our society of chaos. It seems there is not much leadership by examples in either married or unmarried relationships.

I know for me personally that I am just clinging onto grace to make it through my life journey as I am only human too.

Just thoughts rambling in my head.

[ren]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

I think it is sad. Are we so self centered we can't commit to anything but our own immediate pleasure? Marriage is just that, a committment to live not just for yourself but for another. I just see this as another indication of selfishness and immaturity in our culture.

I'm not marrying until I meet someone I know I will be with for the rest of my life. You can consider it sad, selfish and immature, but I like to think of it as showing the institution of marriage the proper respect.

I realize that you certainly weren't talking to me specifically, but I did want to point out that you're painting all us single folk with a mighty wide brush there.

[abowers]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

I think it's not good for the stability of the country to have so many unmarried/divorced households.

However, I am currently one member of an unmarried couple in a household... but we are getting married next August.
I don't know if I agree with kimiko about benefits for ummarried couples... It was a real pain in the butt for me to be able to get the "spouse" rate for the gym here at the university, with my boyfriend being the grad student. we had to show proof of some sort of joint financial investment (in this case, both our names are on our car loan/registration). HOWEVER-- If I were a male, living with my boyfriend -- no questions would be asked, the 2nd male would get the spouse rate just because. I found that amusing!!!

[abowers]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

What's common law? 7 years?

[aurielle]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

A side note - from someone who learned the hard way:

For those cohabitating without marriage in a non-common law marriage state or same-sex relationship, make sure you both have all your legal/financial arrangements in order in case of unexpected demise if you are in a serious committed relationship and want to leave your partner anything. If you don't, the surviving partner has NO rights. None. Your partner's blood family have the rights to everything that was theirs, unless you have your legal 'house' in order. So get your wills drawn up, get yourselves put on or taken off documents, titles, etc, whatever fits your particular circumstances. Don't put it off!

[Snoopy2645]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

Well my husband & I lived together for years before we got married I was expecting my 3rd child when we finally got married I did this for several reasons. Ihad some money he had some debt LOL I THINK??!!! And I wanted to protect anything I had I worked ft & he worked ft we made the same amount of money & had our OWN things we had our own money & own insurance & when I quit to be a sahm I had no insurance & so when I was I was pG with baby #3 we got married so we could have insurance on the baby it wasnt so bad though maybe we should have done it along time ago!!

But we did find out we were already common law & I could have been on his insurance long before then. So I respect anyones choice marriage is not all that now with so many women working & having careers & alot of people brining in children to the marriage makes things more of a mess & reason not to marry because we want to protect our kids if they are not the other parents child!!

And dont get me wrong I agree with above poster about stds & all of that I am just saying living together in a committed relationship without the marriage certificate is not bad I do unfortantely know some people who have been married countless numbers of times which I dont agree with at either!!

[asmom]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

It is definitely a non-issue. I've been married for 16 years but if someone else doesn't want to do it, it is their business. Also there is a certain segment of our population who want to get married but they are being denied their right to do so and as long as this is the case, there is no use getting snippy about the marriage rates being < 50%.

[tinapbeana]

Re: For first time, unmarried households reign in US

What's common law? 7 years?

it varies. some states don't recognize it at all, some say it's after you've lived together a certain amount of time, some say it's after you've cohabitated a single night.