Lizzy and Lissa break down the hidden costs – financial and otherwise – of marriage. They discuss everything from financial pros and cons to social dynamics, unpacking what marriage means in today’s world. Whether you're team marriage or questioning the whole institution, this episode dives into the practical and personal aspects of tying the knot. What do you think, is marriage worth it?
Lizzy and Lissa break down the hidden costs – financial and otherwise – of marriage. They discuss everything from financial pros and cons to social dynamics, unpacking what marriage means in today’s world. Whether you're team marriage or questioning the whole institution, this episode dives into the practical and personal aspects of tying the knot. What do you think, is marriage worth it?
Main Topics
00:00 Introduction
01:42 Running the Numbers Segment
04:14 The History of Marriage
10:48 Our Personal Experiences with Marriage
23:20 Financial Implications
28:59 Benefits and Practicalities of Marriage
34:27 Legal Rights and Responsibilities
36:45 Domestic Partnerships vs. Marriage
38:05 Divorce
41:40 Social Perceptions
55:33 20 Cents Segment
References for Statistics
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/02/08/for-valentines-day-facts-about-marriage-and-dating-in-the-us/
https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2024/families-living-arrangements.html
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/03/23/why-gray-divorce-is-a-significant-financial-risk-for-women.html
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/marriage-divorce.htm
Lissa: There are estimates that about 41% of first marriages, 60% of second marriages, and 73% of third marriages end up in divorce. Did you know that the rate increases?
Lizzy: I didn't, but I cannot say that I'm surprised.
Lissa: I was surprised because I thought you learned and then you do better the next time.
Lizzy: Nah. You got baggage girl.
Lissa: All right, I guess so. Today we are talking about, Is Marriage Worth It?
Lizzy: Whoo!
Lissa: It's going to be a good one.
Lizzy: It's going to be a good one. Let's talk about it.
Lissa: Welcome to NetNet with Lizzy and Lissa, where we analyze hidden costs and empower you to make your own damn decisions in life. Each episode covers a different facet of life. And at the end of each episode, we each give our takes on whether we think something is net positive or net negative.
Lizzy: I'm Lizzy, a strategist and consultant with almost 20 years of experience in finance and investing.
Lissa: And I'm Lissa, a personal finance expert and a certified financial planner. We're best friends who talk about money...
Lizzy: And everything else.
Lissa: In today's episode, we are discussing marriage, which may have an impact on your finances. However, this episode is informational and educational in nature and should not be misconstrued as financial advice. We share our experiences to help educate, but you should always consult a professional for guidance as needed.
Lizzy: Yes.
Lissa: Yep. Is marriage worth it?
Lizzy: First up, running the numbers on marriage.
Lissa: According to the US Census website, the current population survey in 2023 said that there were 133 million married adults in the US.
Lizzy: Okay, that's a lot.
Lissa: That's a lot.
Lizzy: Yeah. All right, so to put that in context, in 2022, the US Census Bureau estimated that married couple households made up 47% of all households down from 71% in 1970. That is a big drop. That's a big drop.
Lissa: Wow.
Lizzy: 71% to 47.
Lissa: And I think we feel it too. We feel that there's less people getting married.
Lizzy: For sure.
Lissa: Yep. A Pew Research Center survey conducted in April 2023 found that only 23% of Americans see marriage as essential to live a fulfilling life. Well, there you go.
Lizzy: Wow.
Lissa: For comparison, 71% of people say that job satisfaction is essential for a fulfilling life. And 61% of people say that having close friends is essential. So people care more about their jobs and good friends than marriage.
Lizzy: That surprises me.
Lissa: Yeah?
Lizzy: Only 23%. Wow.
Lissa: Yeah, to live a fulfilling life. So it might mean you still want it and will do it.
Lizzy: But it's not essential.
Lissa: Essential. Yeah.
Lizzy: Interesting. Okay. Also, according to the Pew Research Center, as of 2021, a record setting, 25% of 49-year-old Americans have never been married. And that's up from 20% in 2010. So in 11 years it went up 5%.
Lissa: Yeah, that's a lot. One in five to one in four.
Lizzy: I mean, that tracks with the people I know.
Lissa: Yeah, it tracks.
Lizzy: It tracks.
Lissa: According to the CDC, the current divorce rate nationwide is around 42%.
Lizzy: All right. All right. And unfortunately, studies have shown that women's household income generally drops between 23 to 40% in the year after divorce, whereas the economic effects are less severe for men.
Lissa: Yeah. Not surprised.
Lizzy: Yeah. I'm not surprised either.
Lissa: Impacts women more. But we all know there's more to life than numbers so let's talk about it.
Is marriage worth it?
Lizzy: All right, well I think first let's do some... Let's lay some groundwork with some of the historical context for marriage because not everyone may be aware of this or just think about it when they're kind of thinking about this topic.
So throughout history, marriage has been a way of legitimizing children. It has been a way of acquiring wealth and status. It has been a way of giving rights to women while also taking many of them away, or protecting them from other kind of exploitation in society because to be an unmarried woman was so looked down upon, especially when you weren't allowed to own property. At the same time in many societies, it made women the property of her husband. So that's great.
And then it has also been a tool for manipulating sexuality and associating that with children or only within wedlock, especially for women and even a tool for managing knowledge because many women were not even aware of how sex works until they were married.
And so there's also a lot of religious implications, obviously marriage for many religions being a sacred or holy union. But I found this one kind of list, this is from an anthropologist named Edmund Leach, and he looked across societies at the meaning of marriage and throughout history. And he said that there's no one definition of marriage applied to all cultures, but there is a list of 10 rights associated with marriage throughout history.
Lissa: This is from the year 1955.
Lizzy: This is from the year 1955, but it's reflecting history. So not necessarily what existed in 1955. These were the rights associated with marriage across cultures. One, to establish a legal father of a woman's children and to establish a legal mother of a man's children, to give the husband a monopoly in the wife's sexuality and to give the wife a monopoly in the husband's sexuality, to give the husband partial or monopolistic rights to the wife's domestic and other labor services and vice versa for the wife.
Lissa: Vice versa.
Lizzy: To give the husband partial or total control over property belonging or potentially accruing to the wife and vice versa, theoretically, to establish a joint fund of property, a partnership for the benefit of the children of the marriage, and to establish a socially significant relationship of affinity between the husband and his wife's brothers, which is interesting. Very
Lissa: Very specific.
Lizzy: Very specific.
Lissa: That's why I wanted to call out the year that this was written because it's kind of interesting and good context in terms of how many people view it today in their own lens.
Lizzy: Right. Well, and also interestingly, almost all of these were written reciprocally for the wife as well, but the reality in most of history, that wasn't the case. Most of the time the man got those rights and the woman did not. And so it was often much more advantageous for men to be married, but women had few options.
Lissa: Yeah. So I love that you set the stage with that because clearly over time, over history, there's been an evolution of what marriage is, but even then it's been multifaceted. There's what marriage is as an understanding of governments as well as the understanding of what a man thinks it is and what a woman thinks it is and what the reality is in society and culture.
Lizzy: Right. So we often will kind of simplistically think of marriage or maybe have even been socialized to think of marriage as a romantic endeavor, and it may also be that. And it can also be a spiritual endeavor, but it is very much a legal endeavor.
Lissa: There was no word love in this, anything you just said.
Lizzy: Yeah.
Lissa: Right?
Lizzy: There was relationship of affinity between the husband and the wife's brothers.
Lissa: Affinity. Yeah.
Lizzy: Affinity not between the husband and the wife, the husband and the wife's brothers.
Lissa: Yeah. So let's just say in the last, I don't know, century, but less than the last century, it's become this evolution of being associated with romance, love. And obviously there are legal aspects to it.
Lizzy: Right. And I would imagine, I don't know for sure, that that association with love and that... Romance love has existed since the beginning of time. Whether that meant you married that person is often a very different thing throughout various cultures and throughout history, because often it was for social status, for social protection, for advancement of wealth, of your interests, for having children and protection of your children. And sometimes you do have to think of the context of different societies where, for example, sex is part of human nature, people are going to do it. If they're going to do it in wedlock, they're going to have kids because there wasn't always birth control or that isn't accepted still today in many cultures. So there are a lot of other considerations that are not necessarily the norm in our society today, but I have to reiterate how often it has been a tool to gain power over women.
Lissa: Yep. So all that said, this is going to be one of those episodes... I mean all of our episodes are, this is truly a personal choice. It is a personal choice. All you can really understand about it is your own values and views on it, as well as how it works in our current day society, like the implications of it in our current day society.
Lizzy: Exactly. And we may, in this episode, be raising some things you'd never considered. We may be preaching to the choir. And then we'll certainly share our own experiences and opinions, which I must say have evolved and continue to evolve over time.
Lissa: Well, so let's dig in because we have different experiences with it and thoughts on it. So enlighten us.
Lizzy: Girl, okay.
Lissa: What is your history here?
Lizzy: Yeah. So growing up, my parents were married, they were part of the Mormon church. So marriage has a specific significance in the Mormon church in that most Christian wedding ceremonies, you're going to say like, "Till death do us part or till death parts us." In the Mormon church, there's this idea that you can be sealed to your family for eternity, so beyond death, right? You're not going to go to heaven and not be with your family. You're going to be with them forever. So that has a lot of specific meaning and is a pillar of the church.
Well, my parents got divorced when I was 10. And so that certainly threw me for a loop in ways I didn't understand because I was a kid. But I definitely inherited the belief that that is a failure because marriage had been this pillar of what you do as a family. We got a lot of mixed messages from people of like, I felt like we were shunned because of it. And so growing up, I had a positive view of marriage. It was very aspirational and it was just what you do, but divorce was failure. So-
Lissa: That was then.
Lizzy: That was then. Both of my parents remarried and are in very happy long marriages with my sub parents. So I was in a relationship when I was in my early 20s and I had always had this thought, "I'll get married in my 30s." I wanted to take my time. I was in no rush. But I found myself in this relationship and in a situation that I didn't truly didn't know how to handle, where my boyfriend, who I was living with, was from another country. He was going to school and he was going to have to go back home. And I was put in a weird spot that if I didn't marry him, his ex-girlfriend would.
Lissa: Oh, man.
Lizzy: And we were living together. It was my longest relationship at the time. For all I knew, for the foreseeable future we were going to be together. And so I agreed to do it really truly not wanting to, but not knowing how to handle the situation, how to get out of it and how to banish him back to where he came from essentially.
Lissa: Right. Right.
Lizzy: So yeah, we got married. I mean, it was a real marriage in the sense we'd been together for two or three years at that point.
Lissa: How old were you?
Lizzy: I was 21.
Lissa: Okay.
Lizzy: 21. God, I was so young. And I used to hate when people would say that, like, "Oh, you're so young."
Lissa: "You're so young."
Lizzy: And it would bother me so much. But I was. Yeah, so we got married and lived together and had a real marriage for a few years and then did not work out for reasons beyond my control and we broke up and got divorced. And through that process, we also did the entire green card thing. So we went through that immigration process to get him his green card and then he's since become a citizen. So there were a lot of lessons involved in that. One, just about relationships, about the kind of contract side of it, the financial side of it, because we were really young. And so that was a stressor.
Lissa: So were you learning that as you went, right?
Lizzy: Yeah. Oh, yeah.
Lissa: Okay. As most people I think.
Lizzy: Yeah. And then afterwards, it gave me a different understanding of relationships in that I recognize that you can think that things are going well, they're just hard. When everything happened, I thought things were great. They were not. I learned a lot about myself. I learned how much it takes, how hard it is. And I also recognize that you can have something that is beneficial to you that ends. I'm glad it happened. It was a really transformative experience in my life. Feels like it happened to a different person. And it ended.
And so that really shaped how I view relationships of, is the definition of a successful relationship, one that lasts for the rest of your life? And I had to really re-examine this idea that divorce is failure.
Lissa: Yeah. Well, as you were saying that, that was my thought that came to mind, is this narrative that success is being with the same person from a given date, a given age through the rest of your life. I think that works for many people. I think it doesn't work for others. And I don't think there is right or wrong, good or bad, because of the simple fact that humans evolve.
Lizzy: Yeah, absolutely.
Lissa: Some people stay stuck and the other person evolves and it's a compatibility thing. I think obviously this is a very intricate subject. There's so much nuance to it, but similar to you, my thought about it has shifted from that. My whole upbringing as a child and even into adulthood thinking, "I'm going to find my forever person. I'm going to be with them forever." Even now that I have my supposed forever person, he is my forever person, there still is at the back of your head that's like, "Anything can happen."
Lizzy: Absolutely.
Lissa: And that doesn't mean failure, but you live for now, you live for today, you live for the foreseeable future. Beyond that, you don't know.
Lizzy: And it's interesting because even now, knowing that, I still have this feeling of if I get married again, it better work because dear God, how could I be a twice divorced person?
Lissa: Yeah. You don't want to be this statistic.
Lizzy: There's still a stigma in this association, and it's weird. It's hard because I still have that ingrained in me where I kind of judge it too. But the reality is, a lot of relationships don't work out. And usually, that's for the best. And people will talk about how divorce rates have increased. Well, a lot of that has to do with the shift in society. Women couldn't have bank accounts, women couldn't have credit cards. They had to stay.
Lissa: They're just dependent. You were dependent.
Lizzy: They were dependent. Had to stay in unhappy marriages. I have so many examples in my own family. So of course the rates went up. Now women have rights.
Lissa: Mm-hmm. But even the women have rights today, that's still an issue today. It is still a hindrance to women, as we said in the statistic. But in real life, I volunteer for a financial counseling helpline, and majority of the questions we get from women are, "I am getting a divorce" or, "I want a divorce" or, "I caught my husband cheating. I don't know what to do. I never had any control over the finances. What's going to happen to me after?" It's so sad. I mean, that's part of why I do what I do. I want to empower more people and women specifically with their finances, but it's so real. It's so real. We don't know what... We can easily guess that these statistics of less people wanting to get married are, "Oh, we're millennials. We're cool. We are just going to wait until later in age."But no, there's other things tied to it too in society-
Lizzy: Of course. Yeah.
Lissa: ... that are guiding these statistics.
Lizzy: And a lot of that is just the broader acceptance of more options, you know? It used to be a little bit more of a prescriptive society, "This is the path you go down if you want to be socially acceptable." And now I think partially with globalization, technology, just more awareness of different ways of life. People have more freedom to choose that and not feel pressured to do something that they may or may not want to do, or maybe they want it and it's hard to find.
Lissa: Yeah. Yeah.
Lizzy: All right. So tell me about your evolution to where you are now.
Lissa: Yeah. Well, my evolution was exactly that. It was that growing up, all the messages I was fed from society, from my family, from my culture, from Filipino culture, also grounded in religion. I grew up going to a Christian Church even though majority of... Actually, even though the rest of my family, extended family are Catholic, which is a lot of Filipinos are Catholic. But in both religions, in both churches, it's very similar where you find that person, yes, it's guided by love and it's a union. And that's a major goal in life, is to have that union and then become a family unit. Because the second you get married in certain cultures and religions, it's like, "All right. When are you going to have kids?" Which is, that's probably a whole nother episode, talking about kids, right?
So I always had that. So I very much had this dream of falling in love, finding someone and getting married, having the wedding, and then having a life together and a shared life. That hasn't gone away. I still have that, those thoughts and dreams and values around marriage. But in learning more about finance and the legal world of what's really tied to this institution of marriage as it is, at least here in the United States and many other cultures, is it's a contract. It's a contract that has a lot of implications, and so I have something to share.
Lizzy: Yeah, let's go. Good news.
Lissa: We're a couple seasons into this podcast and I've struggled in how I've referred to my partner, my love.
Lizzy: Your love.
Lissa: My love, Alan. And that is because we are having our wedding this year, 2025. We're having our wedding, but we actually eloped two years ago.
Lizzy: Yeah, you did.
Lissa: So we eloped for many reasons, I'll get into some of them in a bit. But I never, as a child growing up, thought that that would be what I would do.
Lizzy: Sure.
Lissa: I always dreamt that, "Oh yeah, you get married, you have the big wedding.' And then right after the wedding you sign the papers right then and there, and that's how it goes. And it's like, no, for many different reasons, for many benefits, we're going to talk about some of the benefits of marriage, but for many benefits, we eloped and we did it. And we've been married this whole time. So I struggle with, sometimes I call him my husband, sometimes I call him my fiance. I don't even know who knows anymore and who doesn't. And I was trying to hold out until the wedding to just start calling him my husband. But my name has changed. We're full on married. We've been married for the last year and a half, two years.
Lizzy: Yeah. And so why did you not tell everyone right away?
Lissa: Well, there's some societal pressure as to getting married. One, family, at least my family, I think they would've wanted to be part of it. They want to be there to witness it and be part of our day, even if it was just at the courthouse. I think that for us as well, some of the decision was guided by very, very practical reasons that we still in our minds thought that we would eventually have a wedding. And we thought probably sooner than two years, so we were just like, "Oh, we could just wait to tell people." But slowly over the last year or two, it's just come out. People will see a piece of mail with my new last name on it if they come to the house. There's different things.
And so we're less worried about it. That's why I'm saying it on this podcast. I don't care who knows now. We're going to have our wedding and that's going to be the celebration of the union. Even though from a time perspective, it's two years removed from when we actually got married.
Lizzy: Two years. Because that's crazy, time-wise.
Lissa: So I mean, I'll get into what led me into...
Lizzy: Sure. Yeah.
Lissa: Well, not me, what led us into that decision. But I'm curious, as you mentioned, when you got married at age 21 and you guys were navigating the financial side of it, what were some of your big learnings or things that surprised you about the implications of marriage?
Lizzy: Yeah. So we were just maybe in a unique situation. I'm not sure. Being so young, I had worked at an agency since I was 18. So I had a real job while all through college and then through grad school. And he was playing basketball. He was in school, but he was an international student who are not allowed to work. So he legally could not work. And so we got married and I was supporting us. He had some support from his family, but for the most part I was supporting us.
And then eventually, went through the process, got his green card, so he was legally allowed to work, but then he's kind of starting from zero because even throughout college having internships and things like that, even as a new graduate, didn't have the same experience that others had and ended up deciding to start a business, which I helped with and kind of somewhat helped fund while supporting us.
And so that was interesting looking back and seeing relatively how much money I made for that time and knowing the stress I felt about it because of those circumstances. I was fine. We made it work, but I felt very insecure. And that was really before I started to examine my relationship with money as well. And finances were a big stressor in my parents' marriage, so that was a thing. Going through the divorce process was interesting because the circumstances of us breaking up, it was very easy to say it was not my fault. So-
Lissa: Wait. Where did you get married? In the state of California?
Lizzy: We got married in California. We also eloped. We had a courthouse wedding and then later did like, I wouldn't even call it a wedding, but a party, which also was interesting. And now looking back, it doesn't feel like I really had the wedding experience. And some of that was for time, but also because deep down I didn't really feel right about it. And so I didn't want anyone to be there. You learn.
Lissa: Okay. The reason I asked about if you got married in California, California is a community property state.
Lizzy: Community property state.
Lissa: And it's also a no-fault state, right?
Lizzy: Yeah.
Lissa: Okay. We are not lawyers.
Lizzy: No.
Lissa: This is just from what I know from my own experience as well. Community property states basically say that what you own and acquire before the marriage remains your separate property. And what you acquire during the marriage potentially, theoretically is shared property. So that can impact divorce proceedings and how who gets what-
Lizzy: For sure. Yeah.
Lissa: ... after the fact.
Lizzy: So it could have, absolutely. I filed and I did all the paperwork. I don't think he ever even read it. He did not want this. And so ultimately, he just signed it. And I don't know that he ever even looked at anything. We just left with what we came with. From the moment we separated, I stopped paying for anything. He had to figure it out. But I theoretically could have had to pay him alimony. He just didn't know that, to be honest, not being raised here. Didn't know that he could have asked for that, and that would've been a pretty ballsy move under the circumstances but-
Lissa: And the no-fault state thing that I mentioned, this is something that I didn't know about either. All of this is going to depend on your own state's laws.
Lizzy: Yes, absolutely.
Lissa: So that's why no one can give blanket advice. But no-fault states means that even if someone cheats, that doesn't-
Lizzy: It doesn't matter.
Lissa: It doesn't matter. You guys are splitting and figuring out the division of assets regardless of who caused the marriage to end.
Lizzy: Yeah. So I mean it definitely could have been different for me financially if he had known or chosen to respond. What actually happened is I had a little bit more freedom because I wasn't supporting someone else and then had to figure out not just financially, but in every other aspect of my life, "Okay, I've now done this thing that I consider to be failure my whole life at 23 years old. What now?" And so it became very freeing.
Lissa: Real quick, other logistical question, because I'm trying to get at the benefits marriage of what you might've benefited from that marriage. Did you guys file your taxes jointly?
Lizzy: Yes.
Lissa: And that helped your tax situation?
Lizzy: I'm sure it did, yeah. I don't remember specifically, but yeah, I'm sure it did. Because I think at least one year, he probably had no income before we got the green card. And then, yeah, I'm sure I did.
Lissa: Okay, I'm calling that out because this is one of those things about marriage as an institution, and we want to think about it as love and a union. But in terms of how the government sees it and how the IRS sees it in terms of taxes, when you are a unit, for majority of people, filing married jointly is going to give you more favorable tax status than any other filing.
Lizzy: Yeah, significantly.
Lissa: Significantly, because you're now combining your incomes into a household income. But the thresholds for how much you're going to get taxed are lower... Lower thresholds?
Lizzy: Well, higher thresholds.
Lissa: Higher. Higher thresholds.
Lizzy: Higher thresholds.
Lissa: Higher thresholds to pay more.
Lizzy: For the same rate. Yeah.
Lissa: Yeah. You get what I'm saying.
Lizzy: Yeah, I got you. I got you.
Lissa: You get what I'm saying. Anyway, beneficial. So for me, my story in this elopement and getting married was that we actually had a episode called Are Long Distance Relationships Worth It? And we actually had my husband-
Lizzy: Lissa's husband.
Lissa: ... as a guest. And so we talked about the dating and relationship, kind of like that side of it. But on a practical level, we were doing long distance, Los Angeles-London. And our discussions about what we were going to do next where I felt had a lot more weight than relative to people who were in the same city deciding if they're going to move in with each other, right? This was, one of us was going to uproot our entire lives to another country to go be with the other person. And the way it knitted out was we decided he was going to come to Los Angeles and live in the US for now until we decided what to do later, but worked towards getting his citizenship.
We actually didn't get married so that he could come here. He got a job that sponsored his visa to work here, which is I think the visa that he's on. However, as we thought about it more and more when he was here, it felt risky that there's a lot of layoffs happening over the last couple of years. We're like, "If he gets laid off, we would have to uproot because he'd get deported." Kind of similar to your reasoning. And so that was one of the reasons, but we would have these conversations that were like, "We are going to plan to get married in the future. We want to be together for the long term. What is the downside of doing this now versus later?" There really wasn't any, except that it's a big lifelong commitment.
Lizzy: Yeah, for sure.
Lissa: And our own views of it from a cultural standpoint and stuff like that. So that did come into play. So that was a major benefit to us getting married because he was able to get his green card and now-
Lizzy: And start that clock.
Lissa: Yeah. One, start the clock to get his citizenship, which means that once he gets that citizenship, we'll have a lot more flexibility of what we decide to do or where we decide to be later. But also it allows him, he's still working at that same job that sponsored his visa. They don't have to sponsor him anymore. He can work here. But he also, if he wanted to, find another role, has flexibility to work wherever he wants. So that was a major reason.
And then another benefit to me was a year before we eloped is when I decided I going to take the leap from my 9:00 to 5:00. I had some money saved up, I had a severance. I actually got laid off. It worked out perfectly. I got laid off when I was about to quit.
So anyway, I had all this money to springboard me into this self-employment and building a business. That money could only take me so far when I was paying near a thousand dollars for health insurance. I had Cobra from my employer and it was just the most convenient at the time to stick with my same insurance company. But for things like that, the second we got married and eloped, I was able to join his insurance through his job. And so there were a lot of other benefits like that. We filed married filing jointly on taxes for the first time last year and saved a bunch in taxes. There were a lot of financial elements that we thought about, discussed and thought like, "Look, we're going to get married. We're going to have a wedding, we're going to be together. Let's just do this now, pull the trigger and do it." And so we did.
I think a lot of people are doing that nowadays. I don't think people are tying... Especially with the pandemic having happened a couple of years ago, I feel like a lot of people officially got their marriage certificate and signed their papers on a much different date than when they actually had a wedding or a celebration.
Lizzy: Yeah, for sure.
Lissa: I think that's becoming more common.
Lizzy: I think so too. Yeah. And that's interesting to see how that changes the feelings about it. Or weddings, which is another episode we did earlier on in the series. So a lot of practical considerations.
So one more thing I want to read out is some of the additional legal rights that come with marriage. So giving a spouse and their family control over the other spouse's sexual services, labor, and property.
Lissa: Who is this Edmund Leach guy?
Lizzy: No, this is different. This is different.
Lissa: Oh, this is a different one?
Lizzy: Mm-hmm. Giving one spouse responsibility for the other's debts. And actually one note to the prior one, that this is important and it varies by state. When we talk about control over sexual services. That may sound crazy, but in a lot of states, rape of a spouse does not exist.
Lissa: I didn't know that.
Lizzy: Yeah. So that's why you're saying like, literally if you're married to that person, legally-
Lissa: They're obligated?
Lizzy: ... they cannot rape you because you're married to them. And so literally, often gives you legal control over their body, which is crazy.
Lissa: That's wild.
Lizzy: So anyway, note on that. Giving one spouse responsibility for the other's debts. So that's a big factor financially. Giving one spouse visitation rights when the other is incarcerated or hospitalized. Also important, you don't get those rights if you're a long-term partner. Giving one spouse control over the other's affairs when the other is incapacitated. Establishing a second legal guardian of a parent's child, establishing a joint fund of property for the benefit of children, and establishing a relationship between the families of the spouses.
Lissa: Wait. So is this like-
Lizzy: This is today.
Lissa: Today's-
Lizzy: Present day.
Lissa: Present day legal-
Lizzy: ... legal rights that come into play. So I bring this up because obviously I was married, I was also in a long-term relationship that functioned very much like a marriage, but we were not married. And things that would come up is, if God forbid something did happen to one of us, we have no legal right to each other. It doesn't matter that we live together, that we own a home together, have a partnership. The law does not care. And that may not matter in your day-to-day life, but in certain situations, it matters very, very much. So if God forbid something happens to that partner, you are meaningless, you're nothing to them for the most part.
Lissa: I would love, and if you guys want this too, let us know in the comments, but I would love to do an episode on Are Domestic Partnerships Worth It? Because there's a lot of legal considerations. So here's the gist of what I know, is that marriage is recognized federally. So you get married in one state and your own-
Lizzy: Translates.
Lissa: Your own state has its marriage loss, but it translates across the other states.
Lizzy: Right.
Lissa: And federally you're recognized as married. You can, in certain states, be a domestic partnership with someone and have some rights in terms of whatever, medical hospital visitation. You can get medical power of attorneys. You can get other legal contracts to go around some of those things, but you're never going to get the full recognition of partnership or marriage that marriage would give you federally, like for example, like we said earlier, tax filing status. So there are definitely some benefits for some people to not getting married and doing a domestic partnership instead. But it really comes with knowing all the realities and the very specific nuances of what matters to you and are you aware of all these things, right?
Lizzy: Right. And so this is what happens when you get married. The other thing that you are risking is what happens if you get divorced, which again varies significantly by state, but in California for example, you have to split everything.
Lissa: Yeah. Yeah. Those proceedings, divorce proceedings can get ugly because a lot of times people get married and don't know these things. No one has to take a class before they get married to understand what does this mean for your finances, what does this mean for your assets, what does it mean for your debts, what does it mean... And like I said, here in California, generally everything you have before the marriage, whether that is money, investments, property, even debts, supposedly it should stay yours. And then into the marriage, it's different rules for stuff you acquire, but it gets murky when you co-mingle things. When you start to help each other with each other's debts or you start to help each other with other things, your money is co-mingled and it gets messy. And so that's why divorce proceedings can get really ugly.
Lizzy: You hear all the time, "This person, while we were married, took out a bunch of credit cards. I didn't even know they existed. And now I'm responsible for them."
Lissa: "And my credit is messed up."
Lizzy: "My credit is getting messed up because they're not taking care of it." So it is an incredibly enormous financial decision to be in a partnership with this person. And the interesting thing is there are a lot of relationships, whether married or not, where people don't co-mingle their finances, they don't even talk about finances, but in the eyes of the law, depending on the state...
Lissa: They both own each other's-
Lizzy: You all own each other's stuff whether you like it or not. And that's especially scary if you go into that kind of relationship or that's what you're comfortable with, but you're not aware that at the end of the day if things don't work out, you are responsible for that person's debts or finances, whether you like it or not.
Lissa: Yeah. Which is why.... Well, you know what? We're going to do a whole episode on this because it's too much to talk about in this episode, but prenups, marital agreements.
I have a marital agreement, and we'll get into that. We're going to do an episode on Are Prenups-
Lizzy: Yeah, coming soon.
Lissa: ... worth it? And we'll have a family attorney come on, just because I don't feel comfortable speaking on it.
Lizzy: Sure.
Lissa: But it is tied directly to this legal and financial side of marriage that we're talking about here. Marriage is a big decision for so many reasons, but I think a lot of people don't think enough about the financial and legal part of it.
Lizzy: Absolutely. And I think that tends to disproportionately affect women, like we said, in the stats, who for whatever reason, whether that's, "There was not guidance. We were not educated on these things," whether that's the fact that many women take time out from their careers to be a homemaker or a caretaker of children, and so then they're left hanging or trying to restart a career if they divorce or just figure it out. So women in particular, it is really important to have this awareness and be educated going into making these decisions. Have your eyes wide open about what you're getting into.
Lissa: Mm-hmm. We've talked a lot about the financial-related things.
Lizzy: Legal.
Lissa: Legal-related things. I want to know your take on, I guess, the social aspect. Do you think there's a shift on the perception of someone being married or not being related to how much, I guess, power they have? If you were at a job, do you think you're respected less if you are a single 45-year-old woman versus someone knows you're married? Do you think that comes into play?
Lizzy: I do, yeah. And I think it's a lot of old tropes and I think it differs for men and for women. So I haven't experienced this personally in an obvious way, but there is some power socially, some capital in being a couple. You can do things with other couples. The men can pair off if they want to do their thing, the women can pair off. It helps you navigate different social environments.
Similarly to having kids, right? When you have kids, you're in a whole new group of parents and you can do different things. So I think that's true. I think being a single woman, especially like you said in your 40s or 50s or beyond, would have different implications than being a single man. And that's just in our society, the meanings of like, "Oh, he's a bachelor" versus, "She's a spinster." Like, "No one wanted to marry her. Oh, he can't be tied down." There's very different implications. And so I think for... This is a generalization, but by and large, it would be considered sad for a woman and almost aspirational for a man, which is-
Lissa: Yeah, not tied down.
Lizzy: ... fascinating.
Lissa: Freedom. I know. Yeah, it is hard. We should have probably pulled stats on that. That'd been interesting.
Lizzy: I know.
Lissa: But I don't know. That's my perception too. That's my perception of what it is. And it sucks because it's just not fair. It's not fair because for everyone, it's such a personal choice, but it does have play in society of how you're viewed.
Lizzy: I was just thinking, it's interesting. So I recently saw a bunch of extended family that I grew up with but hadn't seen in years. We keep up on social media for the most part, but haven't really been in person. And everyone asked me, "So are you married? Do you have kids?" My niece started, who's 10 years old, started going, "She has a puppy." Because everyone was asking and it was just so awkward. And this is in an environment where everyone is religious and very family-oriented. And they're not asking maliciously, but that is the question that you ask everybody at 36 years old or whatever, is, "Oh, so what's your family status?" Because God forbid you just be yourself.
Lissa: So this is kind of funny. So I come from a Filipino household and my mom was the strict one. My mom was the one that was like, "You got to focus on school. You got to get a good job. You got to do all this." And so throughout my whole upbringing, it'd be like I would date and I would party and I would do stuff, but in her eyes, like, "You got to do it this way."
So I got it done. I did well in school. I got a good job and all that. And then I don't know what year or age it was, somewhere around maybe late 20s, around age 30 plus or minus two, three years, something flipped. My mom stopped being so concerned about my job and career and it totally shifted to, "When are you going to get married?" I'm like, "Well, if it was up to you, you kind of banned me from dating all my life." And then all of a sudden..." I mean, she didn't actually ban me, but it was like, "You banned me from dating and then now you want me to get married all of a sudden?"
And then a couple years after that, it became like, "When are you having kids?" I'm like, "Look, I'm on the slow path because of all that hard work I just did. I'm on the slow path here." And so it's just funny because generations have different views of what marriage is and what it means to them and what it means to them in relation to how you live your life. But again, I think it comes down to you and your life. You may have to deal with some noise, but it's such a huge determining factor of how your life is going to be lived.
Lizzy: Yeah.
Lissa: Right?
Lizzy: Absolutely.
Lissa: It also determines who you choose to date, right? We had an episode on dating apps. But on dating apps, I think you specify, "Are you looking for fun or are you looking for marriage?" Because you want to be on the same page with whoever it is you're spending your time with.
Lizzy: Right. Yeah, absolutely.
Lissa: Otherwise, you won't be compatible.
Lizzy: Yeah, it is a consideration.
Lissa: It is a consideration.
Lizzy: Yeah. I think there's back to that kind of like, "Is there a stigma?" I think there is something to being single when amongst people who are married and you can be looked at as kind of trivialized, like, "Oh, well, you don't really have life experience yet."
The interesting thing though is that having been divorced, I really feel that way, that having gone through that and navigated that, especially at a young age. There's equivalents in serious relationships, I guess, but I felt like, "Okay, I'm on a different playing field than most people my age because I've navigated a whole arena of life that they haven't." And so I found that when I would date, I met a lot of people who still had this very rigid view of commitment, this fear-based thing that maybe I had years ago, but I've moved past that because I've gone through some stuff. And so that was challenging.
And then similarly, I definitely felt a stigma and a little bit of discomfort saying that I was divorced and like-
Lissa: Because people have assumptions of what they think that is or why it was.
Lizzy: Exactly. Yeah. And less so now. And maybe that's just because I was young when it happened, and so that was uncommon. But yeah, I'd be a little hesitant to tell people. And you feel some type of way about it. And now, yeah, it really feels like it happened to a different person. It's kind of funny.
Lissa: I mean, I believe it. I agree with that, that you had to navigate, like we mentioned, you learned a lot of things on the way about the financial and legal side of it, but even navigating that amount of emotions, that roller coaster, that loss of what you thought your life was going to be, and then it shifted. That shapes you into a different person. You grow from that. And for someone who hasn't gone through that, it's different for them. Not better than the other. It's just different.
Lizzy: So that makes me think of one specific thing that you hear people talk about in a relationship, is, does marriage change things? There's a lot of opinions like, "Oh, our relationship is great, so why would we get married? I don't want things to change." And then some people will say, "Well, nothing's going to change. It's just a piece of paper." Everyone is different.
In my experience, I won't say it changed our relationship, but it's a very different feeling knowing that, "Okay. We could break up in a whim and never see each other again" versus, "We have a legal contract committing us to each other. Our families are intertwined." There's a lot more enmeshment and maybe that helps you push through an argument that you wouldn't. And that can be good and bad because I will never forget shortly after we got married, finding something I didn't want to see and being like, "Holy shit. What do I do about this?" I'm just going to not tell anyone because we just got married.
Lissa: Yeah. And I am with you.
Lizzy: I can't. And feeling fear and embarrassed and all this stuff. The fact that it's harder to undo can be a deterrent and help you navigate hard times maybe, and also can keep you stuck.
Lissa: Yeah. On the flip side though, I will say... I mean, obviously I don't have a ton of experience, it's only been two years, but I will say on the positive side, I've been talking a lot about how marriage is a contract and a legal thing, but no, I still think there is a magic to it that's based in my upbringing and my culture and my family. And I think that, yeah, now that we are together, but officially indoctrinated and papers are signed, we do more and more every day treat life as a team more and more and more. And I don't think there's any replacement for that. It's so unique to be able to make decisions with someone, to take someone else's opinion into consideration, to be open to their points of view because it might shift yours, change yours, or open your perspective. It is so different in a good way.
And not to mention, you mentioned the hospital visitation and things like that. Those were things that I probably wouldn't have thought about if I got married 10 years ago and I was younger. But now I'm just like, "No, I have so much peace of mind." We recently completed our estate plan together. We know what... God forbid, knock on wood, if something were to happen to one of us, we know what would happen to the other person. They'd be taken care of. So there's a lot of security and stability.
Lizzy: Yeah. I will say that is definitely a feeling I felt even without all of those specifics of just, it was settling in, like, "Okay. This is real and solid and enduring, hopefully." And in my later relationship, that was a long-term relationship, I always felt like there's that next level. As much as we operate as a unit, there's something to me to marriage that says, "We are a family. We are in this and we're a team and this partnership in ways that to me aren't replicated if you don't have that."
Lissa: Yeah. Okay. I knew this was going to be a long episode.
Lizzy: It's long, girl.
Lissa: I don't even think we've even touched on half the things we wanted to say.
Lizzy: No, there's a lot.
Lissa: So we've talked a lot about marriage from our points of view and also living here in the United States, kind of from a western perspective. Have you thought about, because this still happens in other places of the world where there's arranged marriages and it still is that institution of combining wealth. How do you think that impacts someone from an emotional perspective?
Lizzy: Oh, man. It's so fascinating to think how... Thinking of, if I were in that scenario, to me there's never been another option than marrying for love.
Lissa: Love.
Lizzy: However, as time goes on, I think maybe my view of what that is is different than what it could be. And there's a different kind of love, a different kind of commitment and more of the partnership. That doesn't mean I don't want love, but the idea of what makes me feel impassioned is not the same as what's going to have an enduring, fulfilling relationship. Maybe. Maybe they're different.
I always think of The Wedding Planner, the movie with Jennifer Lopez when she's talking to her dad and he says, "Your mother and I had an arranged marriage."Because in that fictional story, they talk about how they grew to love each other and developed care and affection and all of these things. And I think that's probably not always the case, but that can certainly happen as you go through the act of building a life with someone. I can't imagine though. For me, it's just the fact of having those choices made for me would be really, really difficult.
Lissa: And I think the thing to point out is that's because that's the culture and we live in, the narrative that we've grown to understand. And if you were born and raised somewhere else, it might be different.
Lizzy: Yeah. I actually just finished a book about this, a fictional story, but it was basically about kind of a socialite in the 1930s who was part of a good family and had an engagement basically arranged for her, but fell in love with someone else. And it was that. It was marrying someone like you, the joining of the families, the business decisions. And so even here in the US, that has happened and probably still happens to some extent today. Who is marriage material may vary depending on your unique little environment even here.
Lissa: Man.
Lizzy: Fascinating. All right.
Lissa: 20 cents?
Lizzy: Are you ready?
Lissa: Yes. All right. I already know what I'm going to say.
Lizzy: You better.
Lissa: I'm very curious about what Liz is going to say. So 20 cents is the segment of the show where both Lizzy and myself, Lissa, each get 60 seconds to give our 2 cents on today's topic, whether it is a net positive or a net negative for marriage. Where does 20 cents come from?
Lizzy: You get the opinion of two dimes.
Lissa: Two dimes. All right, Liz, 60 seconds on the clock. In this day right now, in this moment in time, is marriage worth it?
Lizzy: If I had the right person, yes, definitely. I think I've said a lot of negative things or a lot of honest and sometimes critical things about the experience, but ultimately I think there's something beautiful about it and there are also a lot of practical advantages. But the biggest thing for me is kind of what you alluded to, this feeling that you've experienced the past two years of just like, "We are in this together. We are a team. You are my person legally on paper. There is no one closer to you than me." I like that. I want that in my life one day hopefully again. And so in spite of the costs and the history, which is problematic for women, I think if you go into it eyes wide open, know what you're getting into and make really educated choices, it can absolutely be worth it. Net positive for me.
Lissa: Net positive.
Lizzy: I surprised you.
Lissa: No, that's what I thought you were going to say.
Lizzy: Okay.
Lissa: But I didn't know how you're going to get there, how you're going to say it.
Lizzy: Got it. Got it. Got it. Okay. All right, Lissa, miss "I got a wedding in a couple months."
Lissa: And I'm already married.
Lizzy: And you're already married. Is marriage worth it?
Lissa: Okay.
Lizzy: Do I got to call Alan real quick?
Lissa: Yeah. Marriage is worth it so far in this two years. All right, it's worth it. Net positive for me. So yeah, net positive. I don't even need 60 seconds.
Lizzy: That's it. That's it.
Lissa: One other thing I forgot to mention that came to mind. I was doing research for this episode and... Yeah, I was doing research on YouTube, so not real research.
Lizzy: Hard hitting journalistic research.
Lissa: I was like, "What are some of the financial benefits of marriage?" I have a good idea, but I wanted to see what other people were saying. I watched this one video from a creator, she had like 50,000 subscribers. So not a small creator by any means. But interestingly, I thought the video was going to be about the tax benefits.
Lizzy: True.
Lissa: I thought it was going to be about all the different, I don't know, I guess a lot of it is tax benefits. There's a lot of financial benefits to being married. I thought it was going to be a lot about that. But interestingly, it was mostly about economies of scale.
Lizzy: Oh, so-
Lissa: Which I think you can have without being married.
Lizzy: You have that like cohabitating.
Lissa: Yeah, cohabitating, which is basically just like if I spend 20,000 a year on groceries and household items and so do you and we get married, that doesn't mean our costs are going to be 40,000. It might be a little less because there's going to be things that we can share, right?
Lizzy: Yeah.
Lissa: Like household items we could share.
Lizzy: I mean, those are very valid. You don't have to be married to have those, I agree, but they do make a difference if you're-
Lissa: But the reason I want to bring this up, and again, we'll talk about this in a future episode because this is a long one on domestic partnerships, but the reason I bring this up is because I think a lot of people make the decision on marriage based on things like that, like very surface level decision making when it comes to love and also saving some money-
Lizzy: Or finances, that's what they think of are the financial decisions. But there's a lot.
Lissa: It goes so much deeper.
Lizzy: There's a lot more than that. That's a great point. Yeah.
Lissa: Anyway, so we are both net positive for marriage. But remember, this is what we think right now in this moment in time. No one can make that decision but you. So what do you think? Is marriage worth it?
Lizzy: Hit us up. Let us know what you think. I hope these are spicy, y'all.
Lissa: I know.
Lizzy: DM us on Instagram at @netnetpodcast, or email us at hi@netnetpodcast.com. And if you want to follow us individually, here's where you can find us.
Lissa: I'm @wealthforwomenofcolor on YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram.
Lizzy: I am at @Live_well_lizzy on Instagram and TikTok.
Lissa: All references, statistics, and resources mentioned can be found in our show notes. This podcast is for educational, informational, and entertainment purposes only and should not be constituted as financial advice. Remember to always do your own research, consult a professional as needed, and feel empowered to make your own damn decisions.