Is marriage becoming the preserve of the affluent?

[ChocolateWombat]

Having been a parent at a state school in a socially mixed area, and also a parent at an affluent independent school, I have noticed a real difference in whether parents are married or not.

In the independent school of almost 600 pupils, almost all of the parents are or seem to be/have been married - on the parents list, almost every mother is Mrs...
However, at the socially mixed school, probably 2/3 of the parents were unmarried. Those who were seemed to be the more middle class ones. It just got me thinking.

Now before this turns into a state school/independent school issue, I really don't want it to. My interest is in the role affluence plays in whether people marry or not - I can totally see that in state schools in affluent areas, similar numbers of parents are likely to be married.

Is marriage becoming the preserve of the affluent and something out of the ordinary for the less affluent? Is this the case and if so, why?

Yes people seem to assume that just because ex marrieds are supposed to pay maintenance they always do!

It's so naive.

Ime there's a lot of peer pressure to get married. When my peer group were turning 30 whole friendship groups seemed to get married within a year or 2 of each other. Surely that can't be coincidental? It reminded me of being 17 and lots of friends losing their virginity around the same time.

Funny you should say that, because this thread makes marriage sound like a condom: a sensible precaution, somewhat lacking in romance and not 100% effective, even when used with care.

Lol good analogy.

Indeed. Plenty of women and men don't pay the maintenance they are required to do by law after divorce. However if you aren't even married then as an adult (leaving children aside) there is no right to claim it which in my view is right. I want and like the current very stark distinction between married and not married in law which allows those of us who want to keep our fortune protected from a rapacious future live in lover to protect ourselves and our children from these money grabbers by simply not getting married.

I do think benefits have something to do with it but agree that the pps example is unlikely to apply to many. Benefits are a safety net for unmarried women with a lower or no income. They are not for unmarried women with a higher income or higher earning potential therefore perhaps they seek that safety net in marriage.

FWIW, I am not married despite being conservative, highly educated and a high earner. My partner has not sought the safety net that he probably should!

I would not expect maintenance so would not waste my time going after it. What my friends did was to try and pursue their ex's through the court and expect them to pay up as they had been told that they would get some form of maintenance, it is the law. It took them 2 -3 years of wasting their lives before they gave up.

On these type of threads the general way of thinking is that to be married somehow protects you from being left high and dry. It doesn't. myself and dp know that we need to each protect ourselves so have made wills, made provisions for pensions etc are named as next of kin and made sure we would not be in for any extra IHT. If we split then everything that is on paper as a 50/50 split we would divide and everything else would be up for grabs. Equally he could go off into the wild blue yonder, I would not bother trying to pursue him as I know I wouldn't get anything so saving me a lot of expense not only in solicitors fees but also wasted time.

Noth8ing protects a woman better than a high paid career. Make that very clear to teenager daughters if instead they are hoping to go into beauty or the local call centre.

A lot of higher earners do pay maintenance. I know someone who pays his wife £65k a year until she remarries. I doubt she'll be rushing off to marry someone else any time too soon. She froze all his accounts when the divorce started to secure finances by the way. Those freezing orders are rare but are possible although not if you've been too stupid to bother to keep track of what bank accounts your other half has or keep it all very secret from each other which is rarely wise. Be as interested in pensions and P60s as you are in your nails and you'll do well in life even if the nails and bust is what gets you the ability to be kept in luxury by a man.

" Be as interested in pensions and P60s as you are in your nails and you'll do well in life even if the nails and bust is what gets you the ability to be kept in luxury by a man."

Lotus - I agree with your advice to get a career but your posts are verging on the mysogenistic

Waiting til they are teens is too late.

Don't buy toddlers wedding dress sticker books!

Nothing protects a woman better than a high paid career. Make that very clear to teenager daughters if instead they are hoping to go into beauty or the local call centre.

Yeeeees, everybody should protect themselves by having a high paid career. Everyone should be an above average earner.

#mathsfail

I don't understand that poin. Are you saying because some people will end up at the bottom of the heap in terms of earnings then it behoves us to say to our teenager daughter being a leading banker/surgeon is not for the likes of you even if you were male; we need legions of care home workers, darling, so that's where you must go to work when you turn 16. Forget all those silly ideas of being one of the relatively few who earn a lot - you're only female, you're working class so know your place? Are there really people out there like that? If so that's really good news for my teenagers in a competitive world as half the competition has parents who expect very little of their children in the earnings sphere.

Yes, there are lots of people with a 'know your place' attitude.

It still doesn't solve the 'problem' that only half of us can become 'above average earners'.

My salary expectations for my children are that they should be able to support themselves to live whatever lifestyle they find most suits them. If they wanted to be bankers or top surgeons, I would encourage them to pursue that ambition, but it's not something I would wish for them.

Precisely, Athena.

A means of affording protection to women that only covers, at best, half the female population (and their dependent children) is fuck all use, IMO.

Lotus, I can see why somebody whose focus is on individuals would miss a point about how things work out at a societal level.

I realise that the debate's moved on a bit but I am astounded that there are people out there who fuss and judge about strangers' (perceived) marital statuses!

YY WhatKaty. Agree It shows we havent moved on from the 1970s as much as we like to think we have.

If there is a problem that only half of people can earn a lot then we have various options - we can ensure our daughters get the higher paid jobs - my girls are London lawyers on £100k and £75k for example; their graduate brother has made the less sensible choice of post man £20k.

Or we could say look no point doing much work darling as you've only a 50% chance of being a higher earner so just take it easy and you can be equally happy on minimum wage (which is true - money does not make people happy).

I just cannot understand a parent wanting their child in the lower paid category simply because the nation requires some low paid workers. it's like saying go to the worst local sink school because someone has to and that's a civic duty or stuff your face with chocolate because someone has to eat it and let other families feed their children well.

I don't think wanting the best for your children means that you are damaging others although of course I know about China's experiment in sending education elite people off to camps etc in the cultural revolution and the position in many states where workers over turn those in power. It doesn't work but it's been tried in the interests of fairness. I can certainly understand that moral argument although I don't agree with it.

But as you have found yourself you can do everything in your power to give children every opportunity to become lawyers but if they want to be postmen then there is nothing you can do.

Ok, let's try again.

Say, for the sake of argument, that everybody aspires for their DC to have higher paid jobs. And all DC are willing and capable.

The problem is then that not all jobs can be higher paid. You can't have all jobs being higher paid. This is mathematically impossible.

In order for some to be relatively better paid, others have to be relatively less well paid. Not because of a lack of aspiration or because the 'nation requires' it to be so

This 'everyone can win if they just try hard enough' is pure Tory nonsense that justifies punishing the poor.

I don't think you understand me. I am just saying a mother owes it to her teenage daughter to encourage her into the better paid half rather than saying we need the low paid drones and it is your moral duty to take your place amongst them. That's the only point I am making. However if you want your children in the lower paid jobs that's fine - less competition for my 5 little darlings. Bring it on.

What about a mother encouraging her teenage son? Or do boys/men have no worth in your world?

It is quite a deep-rooted thing tbh, I'm heavily pg and feel really self conscious if I go out having forgotten to put my wedding ring on.

I am married but never wear my wedding ring. I thought it was because I am a feminist, now I realise it is because I am a common working class scrubber with the morals of an alley cat.

rather than saying we need the low paid drones

Um, but we need people to do the jobs that are currently low pay, do we not? 'Drone' (how rude) shit like, y'know, nursing, teaching, social care, people working in shops/restaurants etc.

Somebody's DC have to do these jobs because they need doing. To my mind that's an argument for higher pay at what you deem 'the bottom', and control of runaway pay at 'the top'.

In that world, 'marriage as business contract' wouldn't be necessary. Like it isn't for people who haven't got a pot.

I'm not that invested in hierarchy and status because it doesn't seem a healthy foundation for a society, so I'm not wildly impressed by your girls and their stellar careers, at least not more impressed by them than by anyone else who works to keep our collective show on the road.

I'm not married and used to be called Mrs at my DD private school. maybe private schools are more likely to address mothers as Mrs

I consider my time training as a lawyer as the most wasted time in my life, and having read the threads from women considering a career in law, it's certainly not something I would wish for my children, although if they were certain they wanted to do it, I would encourage them.