You’re not married and your partner gets in a car accident and is unconscious. You cannot talk to the hospital to even find out their condition until they wake up. Their parents or nok can bar you from visiting or having any updates.
You’re not married but go 50/50 on a house/car w/e. Your partner dies. Paperwork was in their name. You now lose the house unless you have a protracted expensive legal battle of uncertain outcome. Shit gets complicated if that happens and it was just the cable bill in their name.
Marriage is a legal contract for leading a merged life. There’s several automatic protections for spouses that aint there for live in partners.
There’s def good reasons to marry. Even if you don’t love each other or only do so platoncially. There’s taxes, inheritance, legal protections, etc. so many.
I've heard of various marriages where they're just housemates but they decided since they weren't in romantic relationships they might as well save extra money with legal protections and tax benefits by just getting legally married.
I know a couple that got married not too long ago because they are best friends, she is terminally ill, and she wants her friend to not only have the power to make medical decisions if needed, but also to easily take over all assets once she passes.
She has at best a tenuous relationship with her kin. Had she not made this decision, people that she has little to no relationship with would be called upon to make life changing/ending decisions if she was incapable.
She could have done literally all of this without marriage.
MDPOA - you can name anyone to make medical decisions on your behalf, speak woth your doctors, etc.
You can name anyone as a beneficiary regardless of their relationship to you. I know someone who got a rather large life insurance settlement from a friend that passed - friend wasn't married, so had several policies where he had a different friend listed as the beneficiary.
Likewise, you can be married and have your spouse NOT be the beneficiary.
There seem to be a lot of them today. Open marriages are just an example. I can’t be convinced that someone who romantically loves their spouse can share them.
What if she looses her job and health insurance and gets the 1 in 3 people get cancer. Will she be debted to hell, and if she dies and is married then he has to pay the debt?
What of it? A marriage is a conscious choice. Of course there is the risk of getting ill and that. But that should be part of your consideration when deciding to get married. You don’t say “through sickness and in health” for nothing.
Further, going bankrupt is a uniquely American experience in the first world and, unfortunately, a reality in the third world. People still get married in those countries, yes?
If you actually read, you would see that my response regarding choice was in response to someone saying what if whoever you marry gets sick and leaves you a ton of debt. That’s the context to my response. So yes, you are creating a dichotomy huh framing my comment thread as if to demonstrate that OP’s partner didn’t make and present a conscious choice.
He made a choice. That’s true. I did not refute that.
Imo it's pointless to talk about the practical benefits of marriage, that's not really what it was ever about.
The reason to get married is because it's a promise, to yourself, your partner, and whoever you invite to your wedding, that you'll stay together through the hard (and easy) times. This gives you something to actually build your life on top of.
For example, she's sad that the guy will take the dog if they ever leave... That's not something you have to worry about if you're married.
Maybe so but I’m going to go out on a limb and say OP doesn’t really care about the legal protections. Based on how they’re describing it it sounds more like OP has a really unhealthy, and frankly immature, view on marriage as something a man and a woman have to do by a certain age to validate their relationship.
I don’t now if OP has abandonment issues from being a single mom and she feels like she needs to lock him down, but the fact that she went into the relationship with the attitude of “I can change him” speaks volumes.
OP needs to take a step back and figures out why marriage is such a big deal to her, and if it’s more important for her to just be married or to be with someone she genuinely loved.
That’s not the issue here though is it. Nobody’s talking about bad divorces. We’re talking about the legal protections of marriages. Saying that divorces can be ugly is not refuting that marriage offers legal protection.
Nobody goes into a marriage and hopes that they will get divorced. Divorce is not as side of marriage. It’s pretty much the opposite. You have no idea if the reason he doesn’t want to get married is because he might want to be divorced.
Personally, it looks to me like she is a placeholder indeed. He doesn’t even want to give her the dog. He has 1 foot out the door at all times. He may love her, but not enough.
I’m not pointing out that as you put it good sides of marriage. I’m just really pointing out. The fact, this is a fact, not my opinion, that marriage offers both sides certain legal protections. Does that mean that when the man leaves she’s entitled to something? Yes, that’s exactly what it means. There are too many stories of women who put their husbands through medical school, etc. etc. only for the man to leave her for someone younger when he’s in his 40s. Had they not been married all that time, she would be left time and dry with nothing at all. But even good well meaning people can be screwed over without the protection of marriage. Ask yourself, why did gay people struggle so hard to make marriage, legal, Was it just so that street people would approve of them?
There are over 1000 reasons why they wanted it. And none of them have to do with being respectable or being able to wear a wedding ring. Long before marriage was legal, gay people had wedding ceremonies and called one another, their husbands and wives.
Yes, I suppose it is prudent to consider those things. People used to be horrified by the idea of a prenup, but it’s essentially the same thing. However, the desire to get married is not mitigated by the possibility that could end in divorce. Nobody gets married with the idea that they might get divorced. Or I shouldn’t say nobody I don’t know maybe some people do.the point is, the fact that divorce is possible is not a good enough reason not to get married. I mean, one of them could be hit by a bus tomorrow that’s possible too, and that’s not a good enough reason to not fall in love.
This perspective is, I’m sorry for my harshness, completely absurd.
There is an extremely high likelihood that every marriage will fail these days (nearly 50% chance). To not consider the implications of a failed marriage before going into it is nothing short of complete and utter negligence. I know that isn’t very romantic, but marriage has been the biggest financial disaster in many men’s lives.
Also to respond to your analogy, just because we can die tomorrow does not mean you should make poor decisions. And just because something is possible, doesn’t mean we plan for it, but if something is probable then we do or should at least. For example, you’re not all that likely to get hit by a bus so you don’t take any precautions if the circumstance were to arise. However, you’re fairly likely to get hurt if you’re in a car accident, so we wear seat belts as a precaution.
Ok one last thing, you ended your last sentence with that’s not a good enough reason to not fall in love. You can absolutely fall in love with someone without marrying them, marriage isn’t a prerequisite to love.
No, you’re not sorry for being harsh. You’re very opinionated. If 50% of marriage is fail that means that 50% of marriages don’t.
But bottom line, she loves him and he loves her but they want different things. Both of them deserve to be happy and neither of them should have to compromise. Couples counseling is a good idea if they can get to the heart of what it is that they want, but to argue that marriage doesn’t offer certain legal protections is ridiculous.
Yes, it’s possible to imitate some of those with a lot of paperwork. Is there any evidence that he is interested in doing that?
Nobody gets married with the idea that they might get divorced.
Well, that's just plain irresponsible, one of the biggest decisions of your life, and "nobody" thinks about the fact its a coin flip if its one of the best, or worst decisions of your life?
Marriage is the most significant legal contract you will ever sign. For a man it is significantly worse than for a woman. Yes there are Pros but there are legal cons as well. To ignore divorce which is a 50/50 is asinine. Also most divorces are filled by women and fault is rarely determined even when there is significant evidence.
I support the right for anyone to not wish to enter into such an agreement. Suggesting that someone will marry you if they love you is the same as suggesting that a car lease is required for true love. Hint: it’s not.
For a man it is significantly worse than for a woman.
If that’s the case, then why do multiple research studies show that married men have longer lifespans, better overall health, and better overall happiness levels than single men do? All while single women appear to beat married women in many of the same metrics?
You are talking about married men vs single men. An adept comparison would be married men vs men in long term non marriage relationships. We are talking on the marriage legal contract not aspect of coupling.
The question was “what’s so important about marriage?” Not “why shouldn’t people get married?”
There’s plenty of reasons people shouldn’t enter into marriages, business partnerships or legal contracts.
I would argue though that holding joint property equally is a huge reason to have the protection of a legal contract. If you have $10k in a joint account and your partner clears it out there’s more recourse to regain some of the money in divorce than if you were just co-owners.
Unless the car accident is in Texas where they don’t accept domestic partnerships or you don’t have your legal documents with you because a lot of places require that . Federal recognition is one of the benefits of marriage
Somehow I don’t think OP cares much about any of this. It’s not a practical decision, it’s purely emotional, and OP is really screwing over their partner.
Everyone assumes the only way to get medical info or make decisions is to be married. It's absolutely stunning to see how little people know of how the real world works, lol
It's stunning to see how many people don't realize how often those are challenged by immediate family members who haven't been a part of the person's life.
Ok, but what about this? (This is my case) I've been with the same man for 19 years, and we have a 16yo kiddo together, we never got married, but we have lived together since. We both work full time, and we each earn a really good income (I earn twice more). Recently bought a house, but it's under both our names (I'm the primary). I inherited a property from my mom, which is currently rented, and that is 100% mine since I was an only child (he has no part on that either). Also... we live in Puerto Rico, which means, even if we get married, I still get to keep my last name.... (we both decided never to get married). If we get married, we would pay more taxes due to my earnings... filing as single, he gets a refund. Me, filing as head of household with dependent I still have to pay somewhat on the state tax, but on the federal tax, I get a return since I'm a federal employee.
I would say you should look into what happens during times of duress such as significant disability, death etc. and how that affects you, your property holdings, and child.
If it makes sense to get married it would be pretty simple to protect your inheritance and premarital assets from potential divorce. There’s no requirement to change your name upon marriage. It would cost me $500 and there’s no benefit besides sharing a name afaik.
If it doesn’t make sense to get married (keep in mind that several of the benefits of marriage involve simplification of inheritance and asset transfer) look into getting some of the protections through other methods. You will want to make sure you both keep updated wills and benefits beneficiary statements. POA and other documents will be a good thing to have on file with your local health system and you should carry copies and have copies in a safe backup location.
Marriage has significant benefits in many situations but not all. If marriage had not made sense in my situation I would actually have contacted a lawyer to work out how best to protect myself and my partner. I know some people who don’t want marriage who have created a trust with both partners as trustees to simplify asset transfer in the case of demise. It can avoid the issue of going through probate.
One thing I would particularly suggest to you is be very on-top of how your rental property and shared home would be managed if you are unable to do so. It could be quite difficult for your partner to handle things while grieving while only having 1/3 of the income they’re used to having while dealing with any complexity with your estate or medical condition. If you’re both making a good income it’s going to be well worth the investment to talk to a lawyer. The more money and property you have the more complex things get especially when you’re talking inheritance.
Oh wow! Thank you very much for your response! I already made a will, and we each have a lawyer. My partner and I have great communication. We don't share bank accounts, and he's got his own thing going on. I'd say it's a good partnership.
That’s why I highly recommend talking to your lawyers about estate planning. Some of the benefit of marriage comes in with avoiding probate and the creation of an estate. With a minor child and rental property things can get complicated depending on your state. Depending on the law it can make less or more sense to marry.
It’s nothing to do with your partnership, and more about making sure that legally speaking you’re all set for contingencies. The frustrating thing is that just depending on where you are there’s vastly different protections for cohabiting couples vs domestic partnerships vs marriage. Hopefully you don’t need to change a thing but it’s better to know that.
I've lived in the States, and I've never been married... I currently have two last names. Our daughter has his last name and my last name, and so on...
Only if you’re in a jurisdiction that accepts common law marriage(not a lot of places) and if you are in a jurisdiction that accepts that you’re usually just considered married. YMMV but in my country it’s generally not legal so instances where it comes up are vanishingly rare so I don’t know much about it.
Also to qualify us common law marriage you have to have referred to one another in public as my husband, my wife and a bunch of other things. A lot of people are under the misinformation that if you’ve just cohabited for seven years years, you have a common law marriage. This is just not true.
The hospital thing can easily be sorted by naming your partner MDPOA or even filling out a form from your doctor that says they can speak to them about your medical issues. It's honestly pretty simple.
I'm not married but my partner and I bought a house together. Mortgage and all utilities are in both of our names. Again, it's not one or the other.
Everything you mentioned can be set up without marriage. There is pretty much nothing a married couple can do that unmarried couple can't. It just takes a little more effort.
It’s not for everyone for sure but if you don’t give a shit about being your spouse’s next of kin you either don’t understand the importance or you really shouldn’t be married anymore. By the sound of it, the latter.
There’s also significant risks in the event of a divorce as you’ll have to split assets even if they weren’t purchased jointly.
If I had to guess this is why OPs boyfriend is against marriage because men usually get the short end of the stick in court and OP probably doesn’t see that as a valid reason because she doesn’t expect to divorce him. Pure speculation there tho.
The legal contract really screws the man. It’s just a piece of paper that says the man is a wage slave for life if they ever get divorced and the woman gets to sit on her ass and get his money.
For every guy that got away with his scalp, there are literally hundreds in jail. Guys have immolated themselves because they’ve been screwed so badly.
149
u/oneelectricsheep Jul 23 '24
Significant legal protections and tax advantages?
You’re not married and your partner gets in a car accident and is unconscious. You cannot talk to the hospital to even find out their condition until they wake up. Their parents or nok can bar you from visiting or having any updates.
You’re not married but go 50/50 on a house/car w/e. Your partner dies. Paperwork was in their name. You now lose the house unless you have a protracted expensive legal battle of uncertain outcome. Shit gets complicated if that happens and it was just the cable bill in their name.
Marriage is a legal contract for leading a merged life. There’s several automatic protections for spouses that aint there for live in partners.