New system for Marraige...

Great Debates
1

I am not very good at formulating coherant thoughts with things like this, so I will use examples:

Any two people can become Life Partners by merely signing an official government paper.

Joe and Jane decide that they want to be life partners, live together, and the whole shebang. The get certain tax breaks etc. for stating this.

Joe and Jim decide that they want to be life partners, live together, and the whole shebang. They get the same tax breaks etc. that Joe and Jane would get.

Jane and Josie decide that they want to be life partners, live together, and the whole shebang. They get the same tax breaks etc. that Joe and Jim would get.

If, for some reason you decide that you don’t want to be life partners anymore, you both go to some government office, sign a paper, and you are no longer Life Partners, and your assets get split right down the middle.

I don’t see why it has to be any more complex then this. If people want to be Life Partners, let them. If they want to call it off, let them. I think that since any falling out between the two parties would involve a splitting of assets (with no distinctions) would cause two people to consider a who they are planning this with a little more.

ex: Lazy Susan wants to mary Andy Ambitious. Andy knows that Susan is lazy, and may not draw her weight in the partnership. He loves her now but he is forced to consider in depth if he will be able to deal with her in 1,5,10,20 years, because if for some reason he can’t, he is going to take a big personal loss. Therefor, he will be forced to consider the consequences.

I think that this would lessen the number of “Shotgun” marraiges, and unthoughtout (that a word?) weddings, and in turn, divorces. Sure, it would make the religious right to happy, and I’m sure it’s upset many normal people as well, but I think that it would be a better system overall.

So, I submit my theory to the infamous dopers for scrutiny, criticism, and probably some flaming as well.

P.S. please excuse ant typing, grammatical, misspelled, or made up worsd in here. It’s 1:30, and I am working on little sleep.

2

The big question is, at that point why have government recognition of marriage at all?

3

To give certain advantages to those who are living together, having children, and supporting eachother.

4

Like what?

5

For one thing because assets are involved in a marriage. The same reason the government gets involved when you buy a house, a car, or a piece of land somewhere.

Marc

6

Because this is not some fantasy world where everthing takes care of itself. Government recognition of marriage gives legality to the fact that the married are each other’s closest relative. This is important for things like passing on property after death and the ability to make important decisions for each other like terminating life support in the event of a catastrophic accident.

Getting married is not just publicly professing your love for each ther. You can do that in a ceremony without the official marriage. It is agreeing that you and your spouse will have the legal privledges affording being married. That is a legal contract just like any other.

7

Sounds reasonable to me, Chekmate. I don’t see why mrriage - from the government’s point of view - sould be anything other than just another type of contract.

I notice you carefully taken the religious aspects out of it, which is good. The religious componets and all those notions of morality should be left up to each religion, not the state.

8

True enough. I’ve no problem with the OP.

Actually, it sounds a lot like a business partnership. Or, as my accountant once told me, “Go into it like you would a marriage. Do you want to be legally tied to this person indefinitely?”

Though I’ve always thought of marriages as a microcosm of society and therefore society has an interest in encouraging them.

I think I got that from the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. One of the stated rights is:

From that I took that the family, not the individual is the core unit of society because a family (nuclear, extended or what-have-you) is a society. And because of that, society values and encourages it.

9

Chekmate, your system is too open for abuse. Two parties with no interconnection (and a roughly equal amount of assets) can simply sign up for the Life Partnership deal to take advantage of the benefits provided, without providing society in return the benefits of their marriage (social stability, lesser welfare costs, etc.).

Further, the “split the assets down the middle” idea won’t really work to prevent this, even in cases of parties with unequal assets. The parties can have a side deal about how assets are to be valued, for example, so that each side comes out with what they came to the deal with, in addition to the tax benefits.

Finally, this seems tailor made for con artists. Seduce someone rich, sign the Life Partnership papers, then drop down to the government office the next day and get out with 1/2 the assets. This can happen under the current system, but current safeguards make it harder.

Sua

10

Chekmate, your system is too open for abuse. Two parties with no interconnection (and a roughly equal amount of assets) can simply sign up for the Life Partnership deal to take advantage of the benefits provided, without providing society in return the benefits of their marriage (social stability, lesser welfare costs, etc.).

Further, the “split the assets down the middle” idea won’t really work to prevent this, even in cases of parties with unequal assets. The parties can have a side deal about how assets are to be valued, for example, so that each side comes out with what they came to the deal with, in addition to the tax benefits.

Finally, this seems tailor made for con artists. Seduce someone rich, sign the Life Partnership papers, then drop down to the government office the next day and get out with 1/2 the assets. This can happen under the current system, but current safeguards make it harder.

Sua

11

I think ‘Life Partners’ is hardly an appropriate name when it is that easy to dissolve the partership. More like ‘Partnership while Convenient.’

12

autz, there is no reason to stick to that one definition of “life.” Even if for a brief time, one can share one’s life with another person.

Sua

13

I agree with SuaSponte, that this system would be far too open to abuse. In addition, it may even hinder the benefits society would normally receive from lifecontracts.

By stipulating that all assetts are split down the middle upon the disolution of the contract, the government will effectively outlaw prenuptial agreements. In the system we have now, Ambitious Andy can marry Lazy Susan with a prenup, ensuring both parties with an agreed upon resolution should the marriage not work out. Society will benefit for the time these two are together, but would see no benefit if Andy decided not to marry Susan because prenups were unavailable.

Additionally, sometimes the assetts shouldn’t be split down the middle. A woman marries a richer man. Over the years he becomes bitter and begins to beat her. Just before she summons the courage to end the abusive relationship, she becomes wealthy from the inheritance of her dearly departed Great Uncle. Should the wife beater get half the inheritance?

You can argue that, like Ambitious Andy, she should of thought of the possible outcomes before entering into the contract, but “buyer beware” isn’t a very useful concept in love and social engineering.

14

Having this as a requirement of the “Life Partnership” contract would not work. There are just too many economic variables to deal with when matching two people. I can see that as being the defult arrangement, but couples would have to have the way to modify that to fit their own situations.

Take out the “1/2 Assets” rule and you’ve done away with all but one of the objections posted so far leaving us with SuaSponte’s “open to abuse” concern.

15

In general, I like this suggestion, but SuaSponte and Beeblebrox bring up some good points about division of assets on termination of the “contract”.

What if the OP is modified slightly so that the 50/50 division of assets is the standard division specified in the contract, but it could be overriden by a custom division (a.k.a. a pre-nup)?

I think this would address all of the objections stated in this thread except for SuaSponte’s first - two parties with no interconnection taking advantage of the system.

But now that I think about it, modifying the OP as I suggested isn’t really all that different then the current U.S. system, except that it allows same-sex marriages.

16

This would also encourage “marriages” that aren’t based on romance or sex.

I’m watching my parent’s generation start to die off these days leaving a widow or widower behind. Often these folks have been married all their adult lives and have become very accustomed to having a partner there with them. They would like to establish a new partnership for all sorts of good reasons, but are a little embarrased by the prospect of dating and holding hands and basically pretending to be 50 years younger than they really are. I think they are also uncomfortable with the possible perception that they have picked up a replacement spouse that is suddenly on equal footing with someone with whom they shared their lives for decades.

The proposed “Life Partnership” would allow them to establish a new partnership for all sorts of good reasons without raising it to the level of a true marriage.

17

Why not modify the OP so that assets that are acquired post Life Partnering are split down the middle. That way we avoid any fraud that might occur if a rich woman marries a young gigolo. We could allow pre nups as well.

18

bnorton you scooped me! Our posts are almost identical.

I agree that changing the name from marriage to life-partnership would change the elderly’s perception, probably exactly as you suggested.

But in practice, it really isn’t any harder for the old couple to go down to city hall. And from the government’s view, I suspect that these marriages aren’t particularily useful. Especially since they could be used to avoid inheiritence tax.

Another, unrelated, thing that occured to me is that, from the government’s view, marriage is more than a legal contract. It implies sex and possibly children - hence the restrictions against marrying your sibling, etc. Would someone be able to choose their sibling as their life partner? I guess I am loosing sight why a government would want to recognize a marriage.

19

Marriage as it stands now is a legal contract. You can go to the courthouse and sign some papers and be married. In some states assets are split down the middle.
OP differences are same-sex marriages which I think ought to be legal for the reasons mentioned by Shagnasty re passing on property in the event of death and life support decisions in the event of a catastrophic event. However, wills and Living wills can get around that currently - but can be subject to nasty court battles by other family members.
The questions and concerns I would have about what the OP is suggesting is – what about the kids, should there be any? Assets split down the middle, unless one partner is raising the kids - then what? I just don’t see that this system is all that different than the current one (leaving out the same-sex marriages) and says nothing about the children, if any, involved - surely the only reason that divorce is frowned upon is because of what it does to the children. If no children, who cares?

20

I too have problems with the even splitting of assets. Take my own parents divorce: one person makes a salary of about $175,000; the other (having only gotten a job recently after raising children) makes about $30,000. The latter takes sole custody of the children with no dispute. Half the assets doesn’t take into account that that individual sacrificed their personal career for the family unit; why shouldn’t there be alimony and child support to recognize this?

(Existing assets were split, with some exceptions: children were allowed to keep their own things, and items used mostly by children were kept by the custody-holder, such as a third car.)