Marriage aisle alone is no way out of Poverty

Marriage aisle alone is no path out of poverty-Roland Hamilton

My argument is about if an unhealthy marriage leads to poverty. There have been statistics that show that poverty rate increases because of single-parent families and financial instability in relationships. The author is making this argument because people tend to think the way out of poverty is to get married but what people tend not to recognize is that a healthy relationship comes about that both partners are financially stable and can support themselves and their family. This argument was made on the Atlanta Journal Constitution website.

“ Poverty is caused by economic instability, not by a lack of marriage. Improving people’s economic status increases the likelihood they will marry, not necessarily the other way around. Better pay and economic opportunity and greater educational attainment also tend to decrease the number of children women bear.  A staggering 43.6 million Americans, more than 14 percent of the population, were poor in 2009, according to the new figures. Nearly 4 million more Americans sank into poverty in 2009. This is the third year the numbers have risen, with the largest number of Americans in poverty since the government began tracking poverty in 1959.

For the nation’s most vulnerable — children — the poverty rate has reached 20.7 percent. (In reality, it may be higher now, given that the data are for 2009.) And more than half of the 15.4 million poor children live with single mothers.

 Marriage is a good thing. Children with married parents do benefit — if the marriage is emotionally healthy, and free from domestic violence, addictions and emotional trauma. Children of married couples tend to have higher standards of living than children of single-parent households. But, regardless of what think tanks or columnists say on the matter, moms and dads don’t need anybody to tell them that money troubles can undercut their relationship.

There is nothing wrong with promoting marriage, but there is danger in promoting the belief that merely hitching people up in matrimony will solve this country’s poverty problem. It can be just another pretext for gutting social programs aimed at relieving the poor.

We’ve been down this route before. As an outgrowth of welfare reform, the Bush administration poured money into such programs. An assessment released earlier this year of one aimed at unwed new mothers and their children’s fathers found that it failed to increase their marriage rates or help their relationships.

President Barack Obama has his own take, also backing plans that promote responsible fatherhood, but only in addition to focusing on jobs for underemployed men (making them more marriage-ready in a woman’s eyes) and education for women.

Men have suffered the majority of job losses in the recession, meaning that increasing women’s earning ability is essential to stabilizing families in ways not seen in past generations.

People tend not to marry if they are financially unstable. They tend to break up due to poor relationship skills. Work on both these factors, and we might just see our poverty rate move in the right direction.”

This argument can be formally paraphrased as follows:

1.    The collapse of marriage is the major cause of poverty

2.    Poor women are much less likely to have a pool of employable men to choose from

3.    The impact of economic stress on marriage has increased in the past 30 years

4.    Poverty is caused by economic instability, not by a lack of marriage

5.    Children with married parents benefits only if the relationship is healthy.

Conclusion: If both partners in marriage has a healthy relationship and are both financially stable, there is absolutely no need for them to be in poverty.

Mary Sanchez, the author of this article states, "argument can be classified as healthy". The premise of this argument basically states that the best way to avoid poverty in a marriage is that both partners have a health relationship and are both financially stable. In all honesty, fallacies were difficult to find because the author gave reliable statistics that shows how money can affect marriage. One fallacy that I spotted is how the author claims that more men have suffered a majority of job losses in the recession than women, meaning that increasing women’s earning ability is essential to stabilizing families in ways not seen in past generations. I find that hard to believe because there are lots of women out there that are unemployed and I personally think there are more women than men in today’s society.

Click THIS LINK for my argument on Marraige and Poverty 

Click THIS LINK for a video of my argument