feel like I’m turning into an anti-marriage feminist

3 people can be in a serious relationship

I've seen this happen and there is imo always one person subject to a certain amount of coercion. That's my experience, your mileage may vary.

Once you add more people in it starts going down the road of why have IHT at all.

As far as I'm concerned, the financial and legal protections should for any unit raising children. I think it's the most important job human beings do. It's also when one member of the unit, typically the mother, loses income and becomes more vulnerable.

It wouldn't be marriage. It would be a legal agreement. One type of legal agreement, doesn't impact the seriousness or meaning of another

Exactly.

I never want to be a wife

Me neither!

But if what we call marriage is opened up to flatsharers or work colleagues or siblings and ceases to be a signifier of a serious relationship, why not three people, why not twenty? Marry all of So Solid Crew, there were a few hundred of them.

3 people can be in a serious relationship.

It wouldn't be marriage. It would be a legal agreement. One type of legal agreement, doesn't impact the seriousness or meaning of another.

I don't believe (and haven't for a long time) believed that love and romance has to be the basis of people building a life together.

I agree which is why we had a civil partnership. We wanted to make a public and legal commitment to each other without the terminology, expectations and baggage of marriage. I never want to be a wife.

This thread has been really odd. But I've seen a few posters commenting that they should be allowed to marry their sister or their best mate and I have to say that as a lesbian I find this really offensive.
It smacks of "they let anyone get married now so I'm marrying my brother"

Not marrying - but why should we not be able to set up the same sort of financial, caring and legal relationships as those who have sexual relationships (with or without children)?

I used to know an elderly lady and gay man who had lived together for years, they were officially in a common law relationship, which meant they filed taxes as a couple and also there were other administrative provisions that made sense to them. It was a bit dodgy though, obviously they were not having kids or any kind of sexual relationship

Why dodgy? Why should relationships be understood only through sexual and/or reproductive lenses?

I would say I am a feminist. Marrying my abuser was one of the worst decisions I have ever made. But I know that lots of women are very happy being married, which stops me being anti marriage.

When asked, I just say don’t change your name, and explain how it makes life harder (having to drag out marriage certificate to prove your pre-marriage qualifications are yours, for example).

Women, historically, have usually been the lower earning (or non-earning) partner so it has clearly been a safety net to ensure they are not left destitute. What's good for the goose, is good for the gander. A lower earning (or non-earning) male partner should also have the same legal and financial protection. It doesn't matter (in the eyes of the law anyway) if the husband is a selfish arsehole, in the same way that it doesn't matter if the husband thinks his wife is a money grabbing (insert insult of choice) who is taking away his 'hard earned money'.

Women are happier single later in life because then they only have to cook for themselves and clean up after themselves, they can starfish in bed and there is no snoring to keep them awake at night. No grumpy old man cluttering up the house. Bliss! Men want servants, of course. But we women are sick of the servitude.

Personally OP, I can't relate to what you have said and thinks it's a load of rubbish

Marriage is for people who want to get married (excluding forced marriages) that's it

Oh my gosh kill themselves not
Milk themselves

Whilst I totally agree with your rhetoric about women being divided by the patriarchal institute of marriage and how damaging it can be to women and for men it doesn't seem to matter around actually getting married.

I can't help but consider the fact that men are shown through research to be happier married and women are happier single in later life. Twice as many men milk themselves as women and being single places them at much higher risk.

Those divided female relationships early on seem to somehow protect in later life

FWIW in France a lot of younger people are choosing a civil partnership rather than marriage.
It IS seen as an equivalent to a marriage by a lot of people and by the institutions. So if by being marriage you have an advantage for XXX, you will also get it for a partnership.

@FlyingOink, in France you can do that.
Well not a marriage but a partnership and everyine including brother and sister can do it.
When the government introduced the law, some people jumped at the opportunity
Eg two single brothers running the family farm together
Two women living together in old age etc…

The idea was to ensure that they could leave their ‘half’ easily to the other when they died.

Why should a spouse be exempt from IHT and not anyone else in your family. My kids are 18 and 22 and live at home. If I died then for the moment they would need to stay there to get on their feet, not be turfed out by the taxman. It’s time the tax system removed the bias towards marriage because not all marriages are a good thing!

Suggesting it's just to save money seems reductive, it's intended for use where household is functioning as a unit which is rather different than people just living together as roommates.

I don't know if they have something similar elsewhere but I can easily see why it could be useful.

I used to know an elderly lady and gay man who had lived together for years, they were officially in a common law relationship, which meant they filed taxes as a couple and also there were other administrative provisions that made sense to them. It was a bit dodgy though, obviously they were not having kids or any kind of sexual relationship

In the UK?

There's no such thing in any UK jurisdiction as an "official common law relationship" Couples don't file taxes as a couple- husbands and wives are taxed separately and each has their own tax allowances.

A general dispensation to leaving it to a friend would not be reasonable.

There's an argument to be had where a sibling is financially dependent on another sibling or they live in a house owned by them or one of them, but otherwise a general dispensation for all siblings wouldn't be reasonable. There's no exemption for children beyond the IHT threshold.

I got married to avoid IHT, simples.

It's true that in some places that have these laws, they are used for same sex couple partnerships rather than marriage as such. Generally the argument is that the issue isn't sexual activity in the relationship, per se, but one is formed around the needs of reproductive roles while the other isn't. While plenty of people disagree with that, that's hardly the same as it being offensive.

Mm and that was the difference between civil partnership and marriage, which I personally didn't have a problem with. (Aside from some pension loopholes). Not the same as marrying an elderly sibling.

There are laws that allow for this kind of arrangement in other places besides the UK.

Are there? Where?

Where can I marry my sister or my housemate to save money?