Two things women often say about marriage:

--most couples are meeting when the woman is in her early to mid 20s, and then marrying when she's in her mid to late 20s. That means they're not riding the carousel, and they're more likely to have successful marriages.

--most couples are marrying later so they can both further their educations and careers, and "mature and grow up". This also makes for more successful marriages.

I will try to go back and source this later. I fully concede the surveys do show that people are, on average, reporting dating longer, living together longer, and marrying later. On average, the time from meeting to marriage is anywhere from 3.5 to 4.9 years, depending on the survey. The last major reported one was 4.9 years from first meeting to marriage. The surveys also show that one of the best ways to make a marriage "divorce resistant" is that both the man and woman are college educated. Both the duration from meeting to marriage and education level are supposed to indicate maturity levels and general preparedness for marriage, which in turn is supposed to predict marital longevity and health.

My counterarguments are:

1) These are surveys, meaning there's not much that's really scientific about it other than perhaps the sample size and selection. They're asking people what they did and what they plan to do or would do. There's not a lot of confidence in self reporting.

2) These claims are valid only if "successful marriage" is defined as "they didn't divorce". Just because a marriage doesn't end in divorce doesn't mean it was or is "successful". It doesn't mean either party is getting what they want. It doesn't mean the man is getting more sex, frequent sex, or sex the way he wants.

Just because he's in a relationship, doesn't mean it's a good one. Women frequently say "well, if he's in a relationship or marriage, it MUST be a good one, or else he'd just get out of it and leave." Not so. Most men have few to no options. Most men don't understand their options. Most men don't understand how female nature or female sexual attraction work. For a lot of men, divorcing an abusive spouse is cost prohibitive. Women use all of these things to full advantage, while at the same time projecting their own expectations and conduct onto men.

3) The demographic for which divorce is lowest is where both are college educated, and that's 17% divorce rate. That means 83% stay married. But a good portion of these couples are staying together because they have so much to lose in a divorce, not because they really WANT to stay together. Both will likely take huge financial hits. She will take a status hit. Women have to work following divorce because child support and alimony won't make ends meet. Divorced women are often in financial straits. Men stay married because they don't want to live in their cars for a year and because shitty, once every other month sex is better than no sex at all. Women stay married because they don't want the standard of living downgrade or the status downgrade.

4) This works only for a small subset of the American population. an LTR or marriage has the best chance of not ending in divorce only if all of the following apply to both spouses: They are both:

--white or East Asian

--college educated

--employed or easily employable

--followers of the same religion and practice it at least semi regularly

--she has a relatively low premarital N (3 or less)

Most marriages today are missing one or more of these ingredients, particularly her low N. (Which means she's still doing at least a little carousel riding, unless ALL of her sex partners were long term relationships, which isn't the case for most women. The vast majority of women take a spin or three on the carousel.) It's well known that female N highly correlates to cheating risk. In general there's a direct relationship between N and cheating risk: The higher her N, the greater the risk she'll cheat on her husband.

There's a direct relationship between reported female N and divorce risk. Generally, the higher her N, the greater the risk of divorce. (There's an anomalous result where her premarital N=2 is 50% risk, which has yet to be explained, but it does not negate the overall trend and results.)

5) Most marriages that stay together are not "good" marriages. They are "average" at best. And for most women, "average" is not good enough. In my opinion and observation, overall marital satisfaction percentages are probably like this:

--10%: Excellent marriages, where both are self actualizing and improving, sex is very good and frequent, sexual attraction is mutual, strong and sustained; few to no marital stressors, and there are only a few minor problems that are easily worked out.

--10%: Good marriages. The sex is good but less frequent, minor problems routinely arise, minor marital stressors.

--50%: Average marriages. Most of these people compromised heavily to get married, or have some unreasonable expectations. She settled deeply on sexual attraction. This is the usual beta bux marriage. Both sides are "settling in" to the marriage. They're letting themselves go physically or otherwise. Average sex which is declining. Sexual attraction is waning, especially hers to him. Major stressors routinely arise, which are dealt with. Maybe some cheating going on, usually undetected. These marriages are just plodding along in ruts but they are doing OK and not in any major danger as long as they can hold the line where they are and no major changes happen.

The problem is that these marriages can rarely improve into "good" and can easily slip into "Bad". These marriages are one calamity away from "bad" to "very bad". A job loss, a dead bedroom, or a major unresolved stressor - any of these can send a marriage downward. Men can usually handle "average". Women can't. Women have exceedingly high, unreasonable expectations of marriage. "Average" just isn't good enough, and she'll eventually get quite resentful stuck in an "average" marriage.

--20%: Bad marriages. These people probably should not have married, or married for the wrong reasons. Sex very infrequent, close to or at dead bedroom. Attraction is more or less gone. There is major dissatisfaction on one or both parts, it isn't getting resolved, and one or both are just living with it. Those dissatisfactions are developing into resentments. Major stressors routinely arise and only some are dealt with, most ineffectively. One or both are probably cheating or seriously considering it.

--10%: Very bad marriages. These are two people who weren't right for each other and should never have married. These couples can barely stand each other. Dead bedroom. Attraction is gone or never existed. Major stressors are present all the time and never get resolved. Full on resentment on one side, frequently both sides. One or both are cheating. They're staying together for the kids or because they'll live in abject poverty if they divorce.

So, if you marry and stay married, odds are you'll have an "average" marriage, where one or both of you are making major compromises that you're unhappy with, and the sex is OK at best.

Give us your thoughts in the comments.