Pro and Cons for marriage/living together

Bogof_Babe

I think Dora and Tribal have effectively covered any answer I might be able to give, Donna.

I'm sorry you are taking this so personally, and I honestly mean you no ill will, but *stuff happens*, and it does seem easier and more straightforward to spend half an hour overcoming all the potential pitfalls in one brief exchange of verbal commitments, rather than chancing to luck. Even more so I'd have thought when children are involved, although I don't have that experience myself. An ex-colleague lived with his long-term partner for many years, but when their first child started school they quietly "tied the knot", for the sake of avoiding confusion re. the child's surname.

I'm not saying marriage is necessarily better, or makes you a superior person. The fact that the law sees it that way is beyond our control, so we might as well go with the flow.

Bogof_Babe

donna-j wrote:

Dora_the_Explorer wrote:

I never denied that the legal aspects were there, just that being not married means you are less committed, as was suggested.

Unavoidably, you are less legally committed. Which is what I understood this thread was all about.

janb5

Margaret Clare -I havn`t gotMaths GCSE either which I always thought I would get...ONE DAY! So well done you.I have CSE Grade 3 which mostpeople havent heard of!

Dora_the_Explorer_5

Originally Posted by Dora the Explorer
I never denied that the legal aspects were there, just that being not married means you are less committed, as was suggested.


Unavoidably, you are less legally committed. Which is what I understood this thread was all about.

Please don't quote me as originally posting the above - I didn't.

donna-j_2

That's fine Bogof-Babe. They only thing I objected to was your comment that those of us who choose to not marry do so in order to have an easier get-out.

gingercordial

margaretclare wrote:

Good luck with your exams! You might also like to note that this allowance was originally called the 'married man's allowance' and was set against the man's income for tax purposes, not the woman's. Things changed in the late 1980s sometime when women's independent taxation was brought in by the then Chancellor, Nigel Lawson. Before that it wouldn't have been possible for us to split it between us. It was assumed for many years that the man got all the income therefore had all the allowances - a working woman had only basic personal allowance, but the Inland Revenue used to write to him about her tax!!! Sounds incredible now, doesn't it? This was something that I struggled to get changed throughout much of my working life, certainly since the mid-1960s. Apparently the Married Women's Property Acts of the 1880s had left this loophole for the Inland Revenue and they didn't have to regard a wife's earnings as her own but as part of the husband's income. I actually spoke to Nigel Lawson on BBC Election Call (I think about 1986) and after the Conservatives came back after that General Election, Lawson brought that change in at the next Budget.

Obviously others were working for this change, it couldn't have been just me!

In spite of my advanced age, which Jan has noted, I'm doing GCSE Maths from September. Why do I need that, with a good honours degree and a raft of professional qualifications? It's those 'gremlins' that have dogged me since childhood, I intend to squash them under my shoe, once and for all.

Wow, that is interesting. I'm only in my mid-20s so have never experienced not having legal equality in terms of my finances (or votes, work opportunities etc) and I can't imagine how demeaning that must have been. Good for you, and thank you, for working to do something about it. Your anecdote will certainly help all this stick in my mind for exam day in November. Good luck to you with your GCSE! janb5, I love the course, but then I like tax, not everyone's cup of tea I admit!

Back on topic, my boyfriend and I will (hopefully!) get married because that's what we want to do, but at the back of my mind will be some element of pleasure/relief at the added benefits that go with it. I don't doubt for a second that the OP and her partner are 100% committed to each other, but in particular the next of kin/hospital scenario is one that horrifies me and one that I want to avoid if at all possible. And not wishing to go off on another tangent, this is why I am so pleased that we now have civil partnerships for gay couples, who must have exactly the same rights as straight couples in order for us to call ourselves a civilised country.

Spirited_2

My partner and I were living together for two years before we got married. We always intended to, I think, despite being somewhat uncertain about what difference it would make. We were commited to each other and a 'bit of paper' wasn't really going to change that.

Eventually it was financial reasons that choose the time for us to get married. My relationship with my parents was, strained, and they were being unhelpful about supporting me through university. I needed to be married to my DH in order to be judged on my own merits for my student loan, otherwise I would have been held back by their large income on paper, despite them being unwilling to make parental contributions.

Getting married gave me unexpected benefits. My parents who had been overbearing relaxed somewhat. Apparently, although we didn't feel it made much difference to our relationship, they started taking us seriously.

We don't regret getting our civil marriage, but it does sting a little that at age 19 (shortly before my 20th birthday) I was forced to get married to be judged independant from my parents, despite not living with them for two years.

Bogof_Babe

Dora, I noticed how my use of "quote" came out, but I did it the normal way (I think) so I don't know why that happened . I decided it was fairly evident that my intention was to quote Donna, and I might make it worse by fiddling about with an edit, so I left it, and apologise for the apparent confusion.

Donna, at the time I made that comment about keeping options open, I was still waiting for either the OP or yourself to clarify exactly what you had against getting married. I'm not sure there has been a proper explanation yet actually, although obviously this is your business not mine. Anyway I again apologise for the annoyance you felt. It certainly is an emotive subject, and makes for an interesting debate. Everyone's views are equally valid but we will obviously have differing perspectives on it.

There was a discussion programme on Radio 4 at 9.00 this morning about the legal side of separation, and it did touch on cohabitees and their finances. It's called Unreliable Evidence, and will be repeated at 9.30 this evening, if anyone is interested.

Spirited - I have long thought that it is disgraceful that student loans/grants etc. are aligned to the parents' finances. If you are old enough to vote, marry (or not as the case may be, lol ) and die overseas in the service of your country, then you should be treated as an adult in your own right. I imagine the current ruling is purely an economic one, designed to avoid excessive drain on the Treasury, especially as they want 50% of all young people to go through Uni nowadays.

margaretclare

Thanks for the thanks, Ginger. Yes, it's something that you young things should be aware of - that all these changes did not come about by accident. Nowadays it's widely believed that women of my generation did not go out to work. Not true. And I have the most vivid memory of how annoyed I was every time the tax office would write to my then husband, now late first husband, about my tax!

I once tried to rent a TV set, that was back in the mid-60s, and was told that I couldn't sign the agreement for it - my husband would have to do that.

Re being next-of-kin if you're not married - this doesn't always apply. My present husband had knee replacement surgery in the summer of 1999 and I was down as his next-of-kin. His divorce was at that time in the final stages and it would have been horrendous if ex-wifey had turned up at his bedside!!! He also had a son, a daughter and a brother, but there was no question raised by the hospital - I was down as next-of-kin and that was it. I also put him down as my next-of-kin when I had surgery in December 1997, and we'd been together a few weeks then. No one questioned it.

Margaret Clare

Thriftylady

In the company where I work, women used to be forced to leave if they got married. You'd think that was a lifetime away, but it actually only stopped within my lifetime (I'm 30), I think it was some time in the early 80s. Obviously I wasn't working there at the time !! But I do have some colleagues who were amongst the first to be allowed to retain their job once they married. Amazingly, I also have some colleagues who were forced to leave when they married, but then reapplied for their jobs once the rule was changed. How they could want to work for a company which treated them like that astounds me. And they are now at a disadvantage in comparison with male colleagues in terms of their pensions, as they don't have continous service......which brings us quite nicely back to how this thread started in the first place, with talk of company pensions !