Summary

One of the staple comments in this community is “don’t ever get married.” With all of the tales of divorce rape, it's a pretty fair piece of advice. But the fact that men have to be told to "not get married" is the exception that proves the rule; and that rule is that marriage is the default mindset.

Unlike the posts hallmarking the horror stories of marriage, this post will encourage you to develop a default mindset of "not marriage" by explaining exactly what marriage is, not from some social, psychological, or cultural perspective, but from a legal perspective by discussing some of the major benefits to marriage. This will give you some tools to analyze whether the legal rewards of marriage outweigh the potential risks in your situation.

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The legal benefits to marriage.

A comprehensive list of marriage benefits would be too lengthy to discuss, but there are three primary categories of benefits to being married: (1) Tax matters, (2) Inheritance matters, and (3) Miscellaneous satisfaction of requirements by a third-party.

1) Tax benefits are the number one benefit to being married. Married couples get a litany of tax benefits that single people do not get. Just to name a few big ones:

  • Income Tax.

Say you’re a successful guy making $120k annually, and you’re living up the MGTOW lifestyle. As a single guy, your unadjusted income tax bracket puts you in the 28% tax category for that level of income. Now, your coworker Beta Bill makes just as much as you, and he just put a ring on Fat Sally. Fat Sally doesn’t earn an income at all. Merely by being married, Beta Bill’s income puts him in the 25% tax bracket (compared to your 28%). Now say that both you and Beta Bill get promoted, and y’all are each pulling in $200k. That bumps you into the 33% tax bracket, while Beta Bill is hanging out in the 28% tax bracket.

  • Home Sale Exclusion.

You bought a house immediately after the 2008 crash when the market was at its lowest. Killer pad, you paid $150,000. You’ve lived in it for a couple years now, the market’s come back, and the neighborhood is booming. You sell that $150,000 home of yours for $500,000. Sweet, sweet delicious $350,000 profit. As a single guy, you’re allowed a $250,000 exclusion on the sale of the home. This means that, even though you made $350,000 on the sale of the house, you’re only going to be taxed as though you made $100,000 profit on the deal (because $350,000 profit - $250,000 exclusion = $100,000 taxable gain).

Beta Bill followed your example and bought a house in the same neighborhood at the same time you did, paying the same $150,000 you did, and he’s lived there with Fat Sally for just as long as you. But because life isn’t fair, Beta Bill was able to sell his house for $600,000, giving him a profit of $450,000.

So how much tax will he incur? …$0. That’s right. Not a goddamn cent. Why? Because married couples pair their exclusions, giving them a combined $500,000 exclusion for the sale of their home. $450,000 profit - $500,000 exclusion = less than $0 taxable gain. They bought the house for $150,000, sold it for $600,000, had a $450,000 profit, and didn’t pay a dime in taxes on it.

  • Unlimited Spousal Transfers. (Caveat: this is a description of the current legal public policy, not my personal opinion.)

The general rule is that any transfer of property ownership, from one person to another, will incur a tax consequence. Meaning, for example, if you give your car to your brother as a gift, there is a tax consequence. If you hit the lottery and buy your parents a house, there is a tax consequence. The reason is because of estate taxes.

You see, public policy says that it sucks in the long term when wealth becomes super concentrated in the hands of the aristocracy for too long. After seeing the consequences of such behavior in British history, Americans decided to not let it happen here by creating estate taxes. The policy for estate taxes says “ok, your deceased father worked hard and made a lot of money. There are three options: (1) you’ll wisely invest/donate that money and become a contributing member of society; (2) since you didn’t earn that money, you’ll have no incentive to work, and you’ll become a socially worthless, noncontributing zero, holding up resources that could be used productively; or (3) you’ll use those resources for political purposes and fuck shit up for the rest of us. Since two out of three options are bad for society as a whole (as had been seen in much of British history), we’re going to tax your estate upon your death to prevent money from idly sitting in the hands of wealthy family dynasties.”

So to prevent wealthy people from saying “lulz, I’ll just give away all of my stuff to someone before I die, then I’ll have nothing that can be taxed,” the rules now include “ok faggot, if you give away more than $14,000 to someone (in 2015), then there will be tax consequences.” (Caveat: this is oversimplified. Estate and Gift Tax matters are much more complex than I’m explaining here.) So if you were to give a car to your brother (worth more than $14,000) or buy a house for your parents, you’d run into some tax issues.

But! If you’re married, you can transfer unlimited amount of value to your wife fo’ free. Buy her the house, buy her the Mercedes, buy her an island… it’s a tax-free transfer to your wife.

And generally when you die, estate tax matters apply when your stuff is going to be inherited by your family, your friends, and even your children; but estate tax matters will not apply when your wife inherits your assets.

2) Inheritance matters are another benefit to being married.

Let’s pretend you’re one of the many people who foolishly do not have a Last Will and Testament. When you die without a Will, you die “intestate.” That’s a fancy legal term for “dying without a Will.” Every state has a collection of statutes addressing intestacy. Basically, since your dumbass died without a Will, the state has a pseudo “default Will” that applies to everyone who died without a Will and dictates how your things will be handled after your death.

Well, standard intestacy provisions will say that much, if not all, of your assets will be given to your surviving spouse (which, if you’re keeping score, is tax-free). So if you don’t have a Will, then your spouse will inherit your stuff. If you don’t have a Will and you’re not married, then your stuff will be transferred to another family member.

Also of note, there’s such a thing as an “elective share.” So let’s say that you are married and you do have a Will, but since your wife is a total bitch, your Will says “All of my things go to my children. My wife, Fat Sally, doesn’t get a goddamn thing.”

Well, the problem here is history. In the past, women couldn’t vote, women couldn’t really own property, women couldn’t have jobs… women were super dependent on their husbands; and if their husband died and purposefully cut them out of the Will, then that woman would become dependent on the state. The state, in return, created a policy that basically said, “look guy, you created this problem and you’re not going to pawn that shit off on us to take care of her.”

So the elective share was born. If you cut your wife out of your Will or essentially give her a bad deal, the statutory elective share basically allows the surviving spouse the option to accept the deal in the Will or ignore the Will and instead collect half of the deceased spouse’s estate. So if you don’t have a Will, the surviving spouse will get the lion’s share of your stuff. If you do have a Will and you try to write her out, then she has the option by law to get half your shit anyway.

3) Miscellaneous stuff.

Many nongovernment organizations require you to be married to someone in order to extend benefits to them. Insurance is one example of this. If you have a solid insurance plan through your company and you wish to add your significant other to that policy to partake in those benefits, then the insurance company is going to have a requirement that y’all be married.

There are a bunch of stuff like this that, like adding someone to your cell phone plan, would make a service or benefit cheaper per person if the couple were to jointly belong. So for example, instead of each of you paying $100 per month for insurance (or whatever), you both would join up and pay a combined $150 (which is $75 each).

Another thing that you might encounter is hospital related emergencies. Many hospitals have a “family only” policy for certain circumstances, where if a husband were injured, then only the wife or a family member could see him. No girlfriends allowed.

So why do you want to get married?

Many horror stories are shared in this community about why you shouldn’t get married; but you need to take it one step further by asking why should you get married.

  • Are you interested in giving or receiving a transfer of property to or from your girlfriend during this year that’s in excess of $14,000, or could tally almost $5.5 million dollars over your lifetime? If yes, then maybe you should consider marriage. If not, then there’s no benefit to getting married here.

  • Are you about to sell a home you purchased and lived in for more than $250,000 above what you paid for it? If yes, then maybe marriage. If not, then no benefit.

  • Are you interested in saving a couple thousand dollars per year in income tax? If yes, then marriage. If not, then no marriage.

  • Are you interested in possibly saving some money on insurance (or other benefits) or want to extend those benefits to your girlfriend? If yes, then marriage. If no, then no marriage.

Literally everything else discussed here that is a default benefit of being married can be contracted for in some way. For example, you can draft a Will right now to say that you want all of your stuff to go to your girlfriend, Sarah Sugartits. There literally is no law that says “only your wife is allowed to inherit _____.” So you can designate anyone under the Sun to receive your assets after you die.

This was done quite often for same-sex couples before the recent US Supreme Court case on gay marriage. Estate planning documents can be drafted to create just about all of the same benefits of marriage. The only problem was that if the person designated in your Will is not your spouse, they won’t enjoy the federal tax benefits. But those estate taxes really only kick in if you’ve got more than $5.43 million of assets. So, for the great majority of people, estate taxes don’t affect you.

Living Wills, Advanced Healthcare Directives, and Durable Powers of Attorney for Health and Financial Matters can all designate your girlfriend to do things for you if you’re in the hospital. And really, when the hospital asks if you or she is family, they don’t ask you to produce a series of birth certificates or marriage certificates just to visit someone in the hospital.

Conclusion

You’ve read the divorce rape stories, so you’re aware of the potential risks and costs associated with marriage. Now you’ve got a better understanding of the benefits of marriage. When analyzing the reality of marriage and divorce, you’re exchanging an ounce of benefit for a pound of risk; so it’s easy to give a blanket statement “don’t ever get married.”

But I’m not here to tell you that you should never get married. I’m here to give you some perspective of what marriage is as a matter of law and when it will benefit you. The truth is that marriage is not really designed to benefit you; it’s primarily designed to provide legal benefits to your family, particularly after your death. There are times when marriage is a prudent course of action; but for most people, the risks far outweigh the rewards.

So always remember to CYA: Cover Your Assets.