Is marriage an outdated custom?

Encyclopedia of Opinion

Question: Is marriage an outdated custom?
Position‹2 of 2: No, marriage is not an outdated custom
Argument‹2 of 2: Married couples are better off

Married couples tend to be more financially stable, healthier and offer greater stability for children.

The argument

According Heritage.org, "decades of statistics have shown that, on average, married couples have better physical health, more financial stability, and greater social mobility than unmarried people." The span matters as much as the finding: a pattern holding across decades is not a feature of one generation's circumstances, which is what a claim that the institution has been outrun by events would require. Marriage is not just about the commitment between two people. Rather, it benefits both partner's overall life, and the mechanism is visible in what the arrangement obliges each of them to do. Along with commitment, marriage holds a certain amount of responsibility towards one another. The couple will rely on each other to provide for their lifestyle as well as emotional support, which pools both the household's resources and the burden of its difficulties. Two people sharing costs and risks are better placed against the ordinary setbacks of a life than either would be alone, which is a plausible route from the institution to the stability and health the statistics record. Beyond looking at the benefits for the partners themselves, it can also benefit any children born or raised within the marriage. If a couple decides to have children, there are studies done that show how a stable home results in a better upbringing. Heritage.org explains how children within a strong married couple are shown to have higher academic performance, as well as being more emotionally mature as opposed to those who did not experience the same. An institution still producing measurable benefits for two generations at once is doing work that nothing has replaced.

Premises

[P1]Decades of statistics cited by Heritage.org show that, on average, married couples enjoy better physical health, more financial stability and greater social mobility than unmarried people, because marriage combines commitment with mutual responsibility and support. [P2] These benefits extend to children, with research indicating that children raised in a stable married household show higher academic performance and greater emotional maturity. [C] Because marriage measurably improves the lives of partners and their children, marriage is not an outdated custom.

Counter-arguments

While marriages often do offer benefits, there are times when this is not the case. Sometimes, marriages hurt the partners' relationship. They may decide to get married in order to help one of the individual's financial situation or even to fix certain aspects of their relationship. However, marriages need more than just love in order to function properly.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] Marriage can also hurt other aspects of the partners lives such financial statuses from factors such as student and credit card debt. [Rejecting P2] An unstable marriage that the partners choose to stay in offers a unstable environment for any children they had.