Living together before you get married. Yay or nay...

What tax benefits? The marriage penalty has been narrowed somewhat, but is still there (especially for higher incomes). When medical decisions are needing to be made (especially when the decision is out of the state of domicile), a marriage conveys decision-making authority that can only be challenged in extreme circumstances. Domestic partners (even those who have filed formal DP documents with the Secretary of State) in one state often have no authority to make medical decisions for their partner in another state. This is the basic lie to the arguments that the objectives of same-sex marriage can be achieved without the institution of marriage for same-sex couples.

 

Then you must also say the same about marriage, since the only difference is the paperwork and legal status.
I can't think of one thing backing up your claim. The benefits of cohabitation are to both and vary from emotional to financial and beyond.

What exactly is the man taking away from the women and how is it not true that the inverse ALSO happens? Relationships are always 2 way streets.

To me, the importance of marriage isn't about tax status, it's about raising kids. If I didn't want kids, I would not have gotten married. The structure of marriage provides better sharing of the responsibility (as well as sharing of the joy). Without the contract of marriage, I'd just be the empty seed packet with a new monthly bill for kids I'd likely not get to enjoy raising.

 

CBO found in 1996 that the "marriage penalty" worked both ways. For some couples, it was a penalty. For others, it was a benefit. CBO found that more people received a benefit than a penalty (51% vs 42%). The average penalty and average benefit were roughly equal, coincidentally. Overall, the net was about $4 billion of bonuses.

Political discourse has led us all to believe that there was only a "penalty".

http://www.cbo.gov/doc.cfm?index=7

 

I'm not a tax lawyer. They consulted one. Marriage benefited them. Sadly, both are dead, and I cannot ask for details.

 

Living together before you get married. Yay...

I lived with each of my wives before we wed... there were other gals I lived with I didn't marry... I am glad we didn't with each of those I didn't ask to marry, and one I should have...

When/if I find a woman I want to marry again... I will want to live together for a while before I marry her.


It's not a test drive... a test drive is far too callous a term for what the adults will be doing... it's learning if you want to make the commitment to someone else first, it's learning if you can commit to someone else before yourself... and that isn't something to take trivially...

 

Yay...

In addition...






I have to say... that when I think of the women I have loved... I lose my train of thought... I am willing to bet some of them will say the same thing about me...


Wellllllll... OK OK... big fat wish stick...



I am hoping while I am asleep at least one of them says she was wanting this/me... but I am sure many generations of men have asked the same question, to no avail... and have awaited an answer that never arrived... as I know I am still awaiting the answers...

 

Re: Yay...

OK OK...


I will use the PUI card...

 

Nay.

I have been married to the same woman for over 30 years.

We did not live together before marriage nor have sex before marriage.

I didn't have to "test drive" to see if we were compatible.

 

I say yay.

But within reason. You shouldn`t need to live together for years and years... But if you have decided you want to get married I think that it is perfectly fine to live together for 6 months to a year to make sure you`re not getting into something you didn`t imagine while living apart. I can`t say I am in favor of just living with a boyfriend/girlfriend if there are no plans for marriage in the future.

I have had two friends who were involved in seriously abusive relationships. The first was dating for 3 years before they decided to get married. They rented a larger apartment and she moved in so they could save up more for the wedding planned 6 months later... 3 months into it she discovered that the wonderful and sweet man she`d been dating would come home dead drunk once a week and take out his work stress on her. He`d always come home drunk and violent once a week, but it was his dog who`d taken the abuse before and she`d never known about it... The wedding was cancelled - she is now happily married with children and a husband who doesn`t use her as a punching bag when his boss complains.
The second moved in after they got married, into a new house they bought together. She got pregnant soon after. Then a similar pattern emerged to that of friend one. Husband would drink like crazy after getting home (turns out this was also his normal lifestyle, she`d just never known while they were living apart) and when mad or stressed would lash out at her and then the baby once it was born. She`d sunk all her savings into buying the house and it took 4 years for her to get a divorce... She said that if she`d just lived with him for a few months she`d have known.

Personally, I lived with my husband a total of around 8 months and then with his family (without him living there) for about a month before we got married. Add to that 4 months of long-distance relationship and a couple trips... I think we covered all the bases. We`re in our 10th year of marriage and still incredibly happy.
We apparently did something right.

 

If you make certain false generalizations about motives of men and women, sure. I would contend that a relationship following such a one-sided model would be quite unhealthy whether a couple is married or not and regardless of the living situation. That's a separate problem.

For a couple in a healthy relationship the experience of living together benefits both partners. Sharing the joys and trials of a common living space takes practice. Some couples just aren't compatible, but what each partner learns from a "failed" trial may result in a much more fruitful relationship down the road. Success provides confidence that those wedding vows are right, and that they will last the long haul. In turn, odds are much better that they actually will.

 

My parents: no. World War II and the prevailing social values prevented that.

My wife and me: no. We got married so young that we didn't have time to live together.

My kids: yes. Both of them lived with their spouses. My daughter also lived with a previous boyfriend, but the extended time together convinced her that it was a bad match.

I highly recommend living together until you can't stand not being married. You have to want it.

Tom

 

It's different when you already have kids. Not only do you need to make sure the two of you are compatible, you have to make sure it works for the kids involved too.

My x-husband is an example of this. He moved right in with his gf who has turned out to be a pretty hard person to live with. My kids suffer each time they are there as a result. They have lived together over two years now, and she has a daughter as well. My x refuses to marry her ( apparently this is my fault too) and so the kids in the situation have no stability. My kids are still day dreaming about the day he will leave her, and her daughter still can't call him "dad". the adults have no intention of making any changes to the situation that is working for them regardless of the fact that it isn't working for the kids.
As long as my kids are home, I would have to be pretty darn sure I wanted to eventually marry someone before we went to the move in together stage, but yes I think living together is the best way to know if you can really do life with someone else. The "in love" feelings come and go and there needs to be something else there on the off days.

 

+1,
Reading some of the posts,it seems like a business..lawyers, taxes..etc

What about the love people, Myself and my wife are together 15yrs and married 11yrs this year and not once did the pros or cons with regard to taxes ever raise it's head,i didn't get married until i was 34,wife was 29,late starters some might say but i know in my heart it's something I'LL do only once,i really can't speak for my wife,she says if we do get to that point,she wouldn't get married again.

 

+1

 

Thanks.

Love obviously isn`t the only reason someone should decide to get married - people fall in and out of love all the time before ever being ready to commit for life. There are other things that need to be thought of... But love and trust should be the foundation. Without those it`s just some kind of business arrangement.

I have never looked into the tax advantages or disadvantages of being married. What mattered to me was (and still is) commitment and stability. Any positive financial stuff is just a bonus I suppose.

 

What does this have to do with the Prius? I hope your not thinking of living in your Car. Who gets the Prius when things don't workout?

 

The pancake house is specifically FOR non-Prius talk!

 

Unless the topic is Prius shaped pancakes.

Tom

 

When you get right down to it, what is marriage, really? It's actually several different things, which can be combined, and often are:

1. It is a religious ritual in which a person representing a church or other religious institution, claiming to represent a divine creator, gives permission for a couple to engage in sex, and in most modern religions enjoins the parties to commit to refraining from sex with others. Often the parties are asked to pledge to remain in the union until one or the other dies.

This kind of marriage may provide some emotional (or "spiritual") comfort to people who subscribe to the dogmas of their particular religion, but cannot be said to benefit people who do not accept such dogmas.

2. It is a civil ceremony in which the parties pay a civil authority (in the U.S. typically either a justice of the peace, or the minister of a church or similar religious authority acting under the auspices of the state) to witness to a civil contract which carries certain rights and obligations, and which entitles them under law to certain legal benefits, including but not limited to the right to inherit from each other without paying inheritance tax, the right to give and receive gifts between them without paying tax on the gifts, and the right to act as power of attorney for each other.

This is a strictly legal contract and cannot be said to carry "spiritual" value. In certain societies at certain times it has been forbidden to revoke this contract, and at certain times and places it has been illegal to cohabit without this contract. It is often expensive to revoke the contract.

3. It is a personal commitment in which a couple (or, rarely, more than two people) agree to a sharing relationship under conditions mutually agreed to, often, but not always, including monogamy and the sharing of property.

Number (1) above carries meaning only for members of a religious faith and administrators of a religious institution who see it as a way to bind their members to them and raise money by charging fees for the ceremony.

Number (2) above carries meaning for governments, which see it as a way to impose constraints on their population and charge fees for the permits; and may be useful to the parties for the privileges conferred and for the ability to appeal to the government if one party violates the contract.

Only number (3) above is of any value in my opinion. When I say that I would like to be married, I am referring specifically to number (3), though I'd have no objection to either or both of the others if I found a partner for whom those had meaning.

The human animal by nature forms temporary pair bonds. In some cases, those bonds are enduring. But unless you believe that a divine personage has decreed that pair bonds may not be broken, there is no reason whatsoever why two or more people should not live together and have sex together for as long or as short a time as they choose, providing only that they do not misrepresent their intentions or conceal sexually transmitted diseases, and providing that they do not make and then abandon children.

Thus I say that living together before getting married, or instead of getting married, is perfectly okay. It's really no business of anybody other than the people involved.

And note that in the U.S.A. today, no contract or pledge of perpetuity in a marriage is actually binding. It is common to pledge "Until death do us part," but divorce is more common than adherence to that pledge. So in the end, in this country and many others, marriage is after all only a temporary arrangement. And I assert, along with many others, that for a person to remain in an abusive relationship is foolish, regardless of religious affiliation or vows taken in happier times.

 

The fight over gay marriage boils down to semantics. Most people against it just want gay people to use a different term. They see "marriage" as a religious term. They don't seem to mind if gays are granted the same rights, just not be "blessed" with the term "marriage".
Frankly, that's what the term "holy matrimony" is supposed to be for, but Since nobody uses that, they want to ownt the term marriage as well.