Introverted Playboy made the following statement over at Just Four Guys as part of a larger argument that marriage no longer matters:
European countries today have even lower marriage rates than the US. I think something like 80% of Swedish children are born out of wedlock. Yet society has not collapsed. It just evolves.
There are a couple of relevant questions here. What are the out of wedlock birth rates for Sweden and other European countries? And, what percent of children in each country grows up with both their mother and their father? From the point of view of the child, parents who never had a wedding but stayed together are arguably more “married” than parents who had a wedding but split while the child was growing up.
I did a bit of searching and found recent data for out of wedlock birth rates as well as the percent of adolescents (11, 13, and 15 year olds) living with both parents from the OECD family database. I combined data from tables SF1.3.B and SF2.4.A and discarded countries which weren’t represented in both tables. I left in the countries from outside of Europe so long as they were included in both tables. Normally data on marital status at birth is presented as the percent born out of wedlock, but I converted this to the percent born in wedlock so the chart would be comparing like numbers. Click on the chart for a larger version, and see the tables linked above for the numeric values represented in the chart as well as more information on the data sets.
Since it combines data from two different data sets there are some irregularities which should be noted. The first is the different dates. The data on percent of births in wedlock is for 2009, and the data on adolescents living with both parents is from 2005 and 2006. In addition, a few countries are listed with two different estimates for the percent of adolescents living with both parents. For example, note that there are two values for the US, labeled United States and United States 2. The “2” indicates a different data source:
2 Data from questionnaire as sent directly to countries, children 0 to 17 (this contributes to differences with the HBSC-results).
Also, the adolescent living arrangement label for the UK says England only while the data on births in wedlock doesn’t include this restriction. The former data set breaks out Belgium to French and Flemish speakers, while the latter does not.
However, there is a bigger problem with the chart above. Out of wedlock birth rates are rising over time, and today’s adolescents would have been born during a time of lower out of wedlock birth rates. Even worse, the adolescent living arrangement data is older than the birth data, so the date relationship is backwards. I kept the chart above and shared it because it is still helpful to see the latest data in comparison, but if we are looking to understand the relationship between the two a different date relationship is needed.
Ideally we would want to look at 1999 birth data and 2012 living arrangement data, which would give us a 13 year spread; this way we would be looking at data for roughly the same cohort at birth and as adolescents. Unfortunately I can’t find living arrangement data that new. However, I did find 1995 birth data and matching this up with the 2005/2006 living arrangement data gets us very close to the relationship I wanted to see. The 1995 birth data for all countries listed except the US is from table SF2.4.B. Birth data for the US is from Table 86 of the Statistical Abstract of the United States.
With this chart the benefit of higher in wedlock birthrates on ultimate family stability is more obvious. Still, the relationship is weaker than I would have guessed. The relationship might appear slightly weaker than it really is due to the adolescents in the chart having been born a few years earlier than the out of wedlock birth data. The data on adolescent living arrangements appears to be due for a refresh, so hopefully updated information will be published by the OECD in the near future so we can see what this looks like with the exact date gap.
The other thing which stands out in both charts is that there is a huge variation across Europe in out of wedlock birth rates and a much smaller variation in the percent of adolescents living with both parents. Greece has an in wedlock birth rate of 94%, while only 36% of children in Iceland are now born in wedlock. The percent of adolescents in the respective countries living with both parents is a much closer 86% and 70%.
Also, note that no country in Europe is evidence that a collapsing two parent family is no cause for alarm. The most recent data available shows that all European countries have a higher percentage of adolescents living with both parents than the US*; it isn’t Europe that is leading in the area of broken homes, it is the US! Nearly all of the European countries listed have 70% or more of their children raised in an intact home, whether the parents had married prior to the birth of the child or not. Given the continuing fall in out of wedlock birth rates, the results will certainly look worse for adolescents ten and fifteen years from now. The costs to our society are in many ways baked in, even though we won’t fully experience them for many years.
*Romania isn’t listed in the charts above because out of wedlock birth data wasn’t available. It had the next lowest percentage of adolescents living with both parents at 58% compared to the US with 57%. The separate measurement of 62% for the US uses a different methodology (skewed toward younger children) and is therefore not comparable.
One important thing is the concentration on adolescents over infants. At about 7 a Father is a necessity for both sons and daughters – for teenagers even more. Becoming an adult – taking both risk and responsibility needs mentoring and a firm foundation. That requires continuity. There can be no moral authority with a transient Father.
Or just look inside the demographics in the US. There are areas where there are single mothers for several generations, and areas where there are intact families. Detroit v.s. its suburbs. But also look at the other large cities like Philadelphia, Chicago, New York, Los Angeles. Detroit is 80% out of wedlock births.
I don’t think it is race – I don’t think if you found an area where whites had as many out-of-wedlock births it would be that much different – but there hasn’t been a generation of “you’ve been beaten down, you need the Feds and feminism, not fathers” drummed into them for a generation. In the case of Detroit, they can’t enforce child-support, and even if they could, there are no jobs anyway, so all you would do is flood the prison-industrial complex. And the “safety net” for a long while has been a plush carpet. For a suburban white or black man with a job, well that is what “Men on Strike” is about – they have something to lose. I would also note in Africa, the genetic ancestors generally don’t have out-of-wedlock births, if anything marriage is more necessary and stronger there because it has to be and isn’t torn down by the society.
Yet there aren’t many other things that can explain it. Are the areas within the borders of the USA with high broken families safe? Is it because the families are broken creating feral humans, or is it something else?
Is Detroit as a society evolving or devolving?
As someone who has lived in Europe, I can confirm that: the younger generation is not getting married, despite being in very stable, long-term relationships and even having kids together. Very often, they would take what’s called a “civil union”, but they are not interested in marriage.
Interestingly, in my experience it is the European women who reject the concept of marriage, with the most ferocity (often citing some feministic rhetoric). Maybe it is because most European countries’ family law is not designed to fleece the ex-husband of all assets? Incentives matter..
I bet if somehow US divorce law was reformed to be fair, US women would immediately reject marriage, just like their European sisters 😉
In the Scandinavian countries it is common for committed couples regard marriage as an optional formality. Couples with children do tend to live together in what are for all practical purposes common-law marriages. Mexico also has a tradition of “marrying” without official ceremony.
The most important universal metric is the percentage of teens living with both parents. In the Anglosphere, rates out-of-wedlock births are valuable metrics for family health, but they are a red herring in a culture like Sweden’s.
Interesting and good work.
For comparing to European countries, we might want to break out US data by demographic (white, black, Hispanic, Asian) and compare only the white data. We know that demographics play a striking role in children born outside of marriage and divorce rates, so it ought to be controlled here as well.
By comparison, statistics show that violent crime (especially homicide), is strongly correlated to race. In the homicide data, US whites and Asians have homicide rates very similar to Europe and Asia (as a whole), US blacks have homicide rates much better than Africa as a whole, while being much worse than US whites, and US Hispanics have rates much better than Latin America (and in between whites and blacks). It all lines up in correlation to the home cultures.
I know it is forbidden to talk about race and culture in such terms, but good statistics demands that we control for the independent variables that are likely to be correlated and skew comparative results.
That said, let me get back to the premise.
What is the definition of success for European (or any other continental) comparison?
What are the metrics? Economy? Birthrate? Crime rate? Drug use? Innovation? Cultural cohesiveness?
Europe has had a stagnant economy for decades (<1% gdp/cap growth), is that success?
Europe has had a collapsing birthrate for decades (so has US and Russia), is that success?
While US has been in a downward swing of crime for 20yrs, which direction has Europe gone?
Drug use seems hard to compare since the laws are so different.
I'm not sure of a good way to measure innovation (patents and prizes aren't very good), creativity, and cultural continuity.
My personal opinion, though the data is not hard & fast in support of it, is that Europe is a 'washed up has-been'. The demographic is collapsing, their economy is stagnant, and they have become politically irrelevant to the world.
Europeans as a whole (Northern Europeans, Central Europeans, Southern Europeans, Eastern Europeans) tend to have different mating patterns from Americans in general (North, South, East Coast, West Coast, Mainland). Europeans don’t have a major problem with broken families. One of their major problems is fertility and not having children at replacement level (and above it) on average.
It is going to be interesting what happens in Russian. Russia has had a low birth rate and Putin is setting policy to change that. His latest was making homosexuality a crime so to speak. he seems to be movie Russia in the opposite direction of the west in the feminization thing.
When new data becomes available for Europe, it’s going to be critical to look at it by religion more than by race. Muslim women have very low OOW birth rates, make up an increasingly large part of Europe’s population, and are the only people in Europe who seem to be reproducing at or above replacement level. Ideally, the data would be looked at with atheists/non-religious people separated out in their own category, too. It’s obvious why Greece and Italy have the highest rate of IW births; they are fairly religious countries.
I think it would also be important to look at any European data within the context of state involvement within the marriage and whether the decision to cohabitate without formal marriage is a response to said interference. Also, one needs to factor in the impact of the Hague Convention on the Rights of the Child. Countries that have adopted that convention are not able to treat children as chattel property the way the US does in its court system. This too may have impact on why a couple would choose to cohabitate without choosing to get married.
Yes, I don’t see Russia in those charts, but I’d like to know what is going on there. In googling a bit, I found that about 30% of births were OOW as of 2004. After the dissolution of the USSR, fertility fell to 1.17 births per woman but has risen as of late to 1.7 births per women (2.1 is replacement level, I think).
Sunshine, the evangelicals and other non-orthodox I know in Russia are raising families of 3 and 5 children and several of the wives are pregnant. Trolling through the friends of my friends in VK (their version of facebook), it isn’t unusual to see families of six or more children, which is a source of embarrassment to the local orthodox, all of whose women seem to develop a biological inability to conceive after one or two children.
Russia is improving somewhat, but it isn’t a big increase (just some increase). Fertility has improved to replacement level bit by bit and the Muslims aren’t taking over (they’re declining bit by bit too). Read “From Russia to Russabia” below, which is an article detailing and refuting the whole decadent varied view of the Muslims becoming some mythical majority.
–> http://darussophile.com/2013/07/08/from-russia-to-russabia/
–> http://darussophile.com/2013/08/06/russias-demographics-continue-to-steadily-improve/
–> http://darussophile.com/2013/08/09/map-population-growth-ussr-2012/
@Artisanal Toad – Salutations. May the heretical evangelicals scatter and not come back. They’re a bad influence and the whole recent NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden getting temporary asylum in Russia has given too much spotlight to Russia (which isn’t good). It doesn’t help that Jews and American neoconservatives (right-liberals) are working together to wreck havoc abroad (it’s not paranoia, it’s not hatred and it’s not a fake conspiracy theory on my part).
Well, Since I don’t see legal marriage as being actually married, and people living together can actually be married in the religious sense of the word (and the power dynamic is closer to traditional marriage in many senses) I’m not sure the death of legal marriage is actually something that should be lamented (even if it is a further sign of decline).
If you want to restore marriage, you have to get the government out of it.
Yay! Onwards, forward! Progressive reality shall be realised!
Marriage today is a rubber stamp. That’s all it is. The real marriage is found in how the parents relationship works.
Since NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden has gotten temporary asylum in Russia, if you’re interested in their demographics, here are three articles below refuting the whole “Muslims are taking over Russia” mantra and myth. The first article has a catchy title and that’s how I found it.
–> http://darussophile.com/2013/07/08/from-russia-to-russabia/
–> http://darussophile.com/2013/08/06/russias-demographics-continue-to-steadily-improve/
–> http://darussophile.com/2013/08/09/map-population-growth-ussr-2012/
I can’t wait until the fall of the bureaucratic-technocratic European Union.
I don’t know how any marriage is supposed to survive in America when the average cost of a wedding is $30,000. Put that debt on top of a mortgage, on top of the expenses of two kids, then add both parents working to pay off those debts (and their student loans), no sex because everyone is exhausted, a dirty house b/c no one feels like doing the cleaning, no good food being cooked because there’s not much time, and you have a recipe for an absolute disaster. I don’t know that we can look to Europe as a model for relationships or economic success. They’re not replacing their populations, and the banksters are stealing everything they have. We only slightly behind them in terms of economic crumbling and will soon see our share of “bail-ins,”austerity,” and bankruptcy.
@Drew
This is a good point. Living together without formal/legal marriage could be more stable for some racial groups than others. By the same token, just because say Iceland has (so far) been able to keep families reasonably together with low rates of formal marriage, doesn’t mean that an individual couple’s chance of remaining together isn’t significantly impacted by the choice to formally marry (or at least formally declare themselves married). If we looked at the internals within Iceland we would probably see a significant difference in the results if we broke out married vs unmarried parents and looked at what percent were still together when their child(ren) reached adolescence.
I don’t have any data on Europe broken out by race. I did however break down US living arrangements by race in this post.
Stupid question but I’m assuming the figures relate to children living with both birth parents?
Lol, new terminology.
Living apart together!
@Feminist Hater
Sadly this isn’t a stupid question. The data gathered by the US Census doesn’t distinguish between biological or adopted parents and step parents. In fact, the US Census goes on the characterization of the custodial parent interviewed, which in the US is overwhelmingly the mother after divorce. So mothers are the ones who decide if their new shack up partner is “dad” a large percentage of the time in the US Census data. I referenced that problem in this post.
The OECD data however does at least try to make the distinction, and the table I’m pulling from for adolescent living arrangements (SF1.3.B for both charts) has separate columns for both parents vs step families. I pulled the data for the chart from the “both parents” column. From the description of the table:
This is also discussed under methodology for SF1.3:
This is a very good way to re-examine the data. What matters more than out-of-wedlock births is single-parenthood. Realistically children should be polled every year or so to discover who they lived with that year. Do that for 20 years, and you’ll likely see that the U.S. family is in total collapse. Evidently with culture being more influential in Europe, out-of-wedlock births does not mean a single parent home more often than in the U.S.
Yes, We’re #1!! We’re #1!!!
Thanks Dalrock.
That OECD site is a wealth of information. The problem always crops up on how they gather their data though.
At least you’re not number one at;
Murder, rape, protests and the number of children your president has…
@Feminist Hater
What do you think will happen when there’s no money to keep the prisons going?
Thanks for the link back to the old post Dalrock.
According to the data on that post, for 2012 whites only, the US has 77% (74% married + 2.8% unmarried) living with both parents, which is right in line with European average (just eyeballing it). This is what I suspected.
Drew,
Good data, but it still doesn’t properly measure the bastard rate for whites in the United States.
If you get your girlfriend pregnant, she has the kid, the two of you live together and you get married when the baby turns two (or perhaps, she’s pregnant again) it doesn’t change the fact that the first born was born a bastard. The fact that the parents lived toegether the whole time and got married later will never change the child’s legitimacy.
If I remember correctly, the bastard rate for non-latino whites in the United States is hovering around 41% (for latinos, about 55+%, and blacks, over 75+%) Asians have the lowest level of United States bastardy which is not all that surprising giving their overall excellence in primary, secondary, and higher education. As Daniel Patrick Monihan said about education and its success for students in the United States, it ALL boils down to family.
Although only tangential to this analysis, I think it’s worth noting that in important aspects… many portions of European society HAVE in fact collapsed:
1 .http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/14/world/europe/germany-fights-population-drop.html?_r=0
2. http://www.irishtimes.com/news/science/is-europe-on-the-verge-of-demographic-collapse-1.1417948
3. http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/a2088728-f544-11e2-b4f8-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2aXs1pM1h
I can see here a very common mistake. Manosphere men think that when you destroy traditional family the very next year society dies.
It does not wrok this way. Betaness and tendencies to build civilization are coded in white and asian men’s genes. It does not disappear overnight. The only effect on economy are caused by socialism. Western world has numbers of single men who cannot find a mate, which african polygynous societies would be proud of. Still there are no civil wars, no significant growth of violence by sexually unsuccessful men. White and asian men were bred to be good and productive. Even when they work only at 70% of capacity it is enough to keep the system working.
It will take at least 10 generations before basis of society starts to crumble. When this happens it will be too late to restore civilization.
Until then women and alphas can enjoy life. Women can expect their daughters, grand daughter and even grand-grand daughters having free time. Noone cares what will happen then.
If I remember correctly, the bastard rate for non-latino whites in the United States is hovering around 41% (for latinos, about 55+%, and blacks, over 75+%) Asians have the lowest level of United States bastardy which is not all that surprising giving their overall excellence in primary, secondary, and higher education.
The white out of wedlock birthrate in the U.S is 30%, not 41%.
[D: Correct. The most recent year in the 2012 Statistical Abstract with this data is 2008, and it shows White Non Hisp out of wedlock birth rates at 28.7%. You can also query your own data using this tool, and calculating 2010 from that data I get 29.02%]
Comparing Sweden to the U.S. is like comparing apples and oranges because demographically they aren’t the same. Less than one percent of the Swedish population is black. The black and white marriage rates in the U.S. were almost the same in 1940 and there has been a much more precipitous drop in black marriage rates than in white marriage rates since then. You can’t ignore that the welfare state has been much more destructive to black family formation. Black males earn less than white males and it’s harder for them to get and keep a wife because black women can often do better financially by going on welfare than getting married. Any behavior that on the surface looks mysterious can usually be explained by looking at the underlying incentives that are influencing people.
The mystery is greater than just what these stats suggest. I’ve come to accept that light socialism works in Europe, and that a form of feminism works better in Europe (not extremists, I’m referring to what we would refer to as the average women being feminist) that unmarried cohabitation works better there should be no surprise therefore.
These facts defy what we like to believe, and its a really good idea to, rather than doubling down on trying to find out that no, its not real, ask rather why does it work. What about the population say of Austria makes the group more easily governable with a socialism light type of system? Why are they not responding to the same drivers we assume people to have and insist that our system is the best system to harness?
Those are not rhetorical questions for me. The answer is in culture, which is almost not an answer because it is too broad.
The lack of marriages should be expected without child support slavery, government support of single mothers, and the end to bastardy. It’s the treatment of bastards and support that drive women towards marriage. In the US women push for marriage to secure extra support which accounts for the higher rates.
Marriage has 2 functions: Training children to be less feral and creating an environment where more civilized people make most of the children. Europe has a higher percentage genetically civilized people than the US and thus the training isn’t as needed as it is with the highly feral populations of the US and the UK. The effect of women selecting the least civilized to reproduce with won’t become an issue for at least 2 or 3 generation in most Europe.
@empathologism
Easy, homogeneous culture and values. The U.S. has probably 2-5 times the cultural and racial diversity of any European nation. For socialism to work, you must have communal action and a tighter bell-curve of opinions that cannot and will never exist in the U.S. Diversity of cultural perspective demands broader-based legislation or you get hypocritical laws that cause societal strife. For instance, circumcision, while accepted in the U.S., is actually a violation of the baby’s rights and a mutilation of genitalia. I predict it will never be fully outlawed in the U.S. because certain religions demand to be allowed to do it. You could far more easily outlaw such a practice in many European nations, fewer minority groups are around to complain.
Dalrock, I have a (serious) question for you.
Despite their more solid family foundation, most countries in Europe are well below replacement levels. In the nonsensical nightmarish zoo that North America has apparently become, it is not the case.
What would you answer to someone who makes such a point? Maybe the white population of the US is becoming a joke from a societal point of view, but at least what they are doing makes it possible to fulfill the prime element of any society, i.e. the hability to exist at all.
Easy, homogeneous culture and values.
Yes, this is what I meant by culture, but is also what I meant by too broad. That it is homogeneous is not enough of an answer. Many cultures have that and are deeply dysfunctional. Its more specific.
@Drew
There are a couple of problems with that. The 77% figure is for children of all ages, where the chart (with exceptions noted) is focused on adolescents living with both parents. The older a child gets the less likely they are to live with both parents (because divorce/breakups are cumulative), so focusing on all children skews the figure higher than what you are comparing it with. The other problem is what I mentioned in my comment to Feminist Hater; the US Census data doesn’t distinguish between bio/adoptive parents and step parents, and they don’t even require “step dad” to be married to mom, just living with her. It is entirely up to the determination of the custodial parent to identify if the man she lives with is the child’s step father. The OECD data is instead based on interviews with the children, and breaks out step families separately. For the US the step parent figure in the table I pulled from is 14%, so you would have to add that back to get the same measure the Census is using.
@Yldri
US whites are below replacement rates, just like their European cousins.
My point in comparing the demographic data (2012 US whites vs 2006 Europe) is that US whites are about on par in family stability; maybe slightly better when considering the discrepancy in years of comparison.
@Dalrock
It would be interesting to compare US blacks vs African nations, to see if the same correlative trend holds. I suspect that African family structure is more stable, despite the higher violence rates.
It would be interesting for a several reasons…
For one, US blacks have been a leading indicator of overall US family culture.
Second, the law structure between US and Africa is so vastly different, I’m not aware of it popular to have the child support and divorce laws that western civ adopted which provides comparison points.
And third, poor socialism/dictatorships in the “christian” sub-Saharan regions, and theocratic/monarchies and dictatorships in the “Muslim” north provide more comparative power.
“US whites are below replacement rates, just like their European cousins.”
According to the most recent US Census data (2008), the total fertility rate for whites in the US is 2.067. This is basically AT replacement rate.
http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0083.pdf
In contrast, European total fertility rates are generally much, much lower. France and England are the exception.
@Sam Dangremond
Keep in mind that the figure for White in Table 83 includes Hispanics, which wouldn’t be apples to apples “Whites” compared with Europe. As the footnote to the table notes:
You can get a sense for how this impacts the figure if you look at Table 84 (same link). There were 37.8 births in 2008 per 1,000 White women (same category as referenced in Table 83), but only 26.7 per 1,000 Non Hispanic White women in the same year. I don’t know why they sometimes break this out and other times don’t. They really should always break it out.
A good clarification.
It looks like the CDC breaks out the data by race so as to separate “Hispanic” from “white”. Here’s a random blog with good charts showing the CDC’s data:
http://hailtoyou.wordpress.com/2012/10/07/the-usas-total-fertility-rates-by-race-1980-to-2010/
According to that data, “whites” do indeed have a TFR below replacement level. I stand corrected. However, at about 1.8… that TFR is still a good deal higher than the TFR in Europe, which is variously cited as being 1.60 overall (so presumably the TFR of white Europeans is even lower than 1.60).
[D: Good find. I didn’t realize (or had forgotten) that the Census and CDC each have their own Vital Statistics reports. I guess it makes sense, and I did have the CDC Vital Stat page bookmarked.]
Dalrock,
I hate to get all Freakenomics on you but as far as Total Fertility Rates go, the number of births per thousand women annually is irrelevant. That data is completely worthless. As Sam said, the ONLY thing that matters is the number of total births per woman. That is the fertility rate, the only number that matters. And that is the only true measure to see if a nation is (baring immigration) merely replacing itself, growing, or dying.
@empathologism
Do you have an example for that one? Even the cultures I might consider very 14th-century seem harmonious within them.
I very much with your point that “births per thousand” (also referred to as “birth rate”) is a very poor measure… and that “total fertility rate” should always be used in these sorts of discussions.
However, I think Dalrock’s point about the group of “hispanic” within “white’ is also correct. As I posted above, it looks like the TFR of “white” white people is about 1.8… which is in fact below replacement, but still higher than European TFRs.
Sam,
On the census forms and financial aid forms they are always noting that white = “non hispanic white” for calculation. So very other, they make those distinctions.
It is well below replacement, but higher than almost all of Europe.
I read a lot of books on Demographics and (as far as I can tell) the only European Nation that has a TFR above 2.1 is Muslim Albania. France seems to be doing just right with a TFR of 2.08, not bad at all, all things considered. The rest of Europe is pretty much f@cked (particularly the more Christian Mediteranian countries not named France.)
Another thing that is wrong with those countries (that can’t be shown in the data), especially Sweden, is that many of them have a bad reputation with regards to each sex. Swedish women are known to be very whorish/loose while the Swedish men are known to be quite effeminate/wimpy.
Why do you think the foreigners always riot? They know that very few Swedes (i.e. the men) will do anything about it.
Obviously, ‘new’ living arrangements are not working out at all.
On a personal anecdote, most Scandinavian men that I’ve seen and met tend to strike me as a strange mixture between quasi liberal modern enlightened feminist and the old explorer Viking. It’s a strange form of cognitive dissonance. Handsome fellas they are too, but it doesn’t compare to red-haired drunk Irish men (red hair is soooooo pretty and cute).
@innocentbystanderboston
What demographics books do you recommend?
If you use Reddit, I’d invite you to come check out http://www.reddit.com/r/Natalism/
So people don’t get married without religion? What’s the overall happiness of swedish men? Do they like this setup?
A doctor was addressing a large audience in Oxford ….
“The material we put into our stomachs should have killed most of us sitting here, years ago. Red meat is full of steroids and dye. Soft drinks corrode your stomach lining. Chinese food is loaded with MSG. High transfat diets can be disastrous and none of us realizes the long-term harm caused by the germs in our drinking water. But, there is one thing that is the most dangerous of all and most of us have, or will eat it. Can anyone here tell me what food it is that causes the most grief and suffering for years after eating it?”
After several seconds of quiet, a 70-year-old man in the front row raised his hand, and softly said, “Wedding Cake.”
Artisinal Toad wrote: “Also, one needs to factor in the impact of the Hague Convention on the Rights of the Child. Countries that have adopted that convention are not able to treat children as chattel property the way the US does in its court system. This too may have impact on why a couple would choose to cohabitate without choosing to get married.”
This “Convention” is a radical feminism gone global with force of international law:
——————————
Radical Feminism and the UN
Radical feminism, now deeply embedded in the UN Secretariat’s global agenda, is being imposed on countries through the prescriptive documents coming from the UN Conference circuit and from the UN treaty monitoring bodies, especially the Human Rights Committee and the Committee on the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). The objective is to bring the radical feminist directives in these documents from their current legally non-binding status into the arena of legally-binding international human rights law.
The basic plan is ingeniously simple. The idea is to couch the feminist agenda in the language of human rights. Under the guise of being obliged to honor a newly-coined set of counterfeit human rights called “reproductive and sexual health rights,” countries are to be constrained by the UN to adopt population control programs dictated by an unholy alliance of radical feminists and population control advocates.
——————————
http://www.pop.org/content/feminist-rights-agenda-storms-un-1523
Soon, there will be nowhere for a man to raise a family without feminazi coercion.
There’s a pretty high rate of rape in Sweden, isn’t there? Compared to the US? Just thought I’d throw that out there, so the next scripted post from a feminist can arrive about marriage not being beneficial to women… except for the not being raped by muslims in Sweden.
So true! in norway if you have more than 2 kids you are considered, wierd, and out of the box. Also, in norway if your child doesn’t go to barnehage and you are a 24 hour stay at home mom. they are concerned about the childrens welfare. There is extremem goverment and social presure for the women to work and children to go to barnehage
One has to be very careful with European data, because there the PC policy blocks every attempt to collect data on races and religious groups. It’s illegal. France, UK and Sweden being better off in terms of fertiliy rate is a myth. It’s caused by large muslim immigrant populations (and thats affecting marriage data as well). In Eastern Europe, 20-25% of all births are roma (gipsy), so the fertility rate is even lower. (Also distorting marriage and divorce data. In gipsy and muslim culture, the default is that there is no divorce).
Agree with Tom.
“Interestingly, in my experience it is the European women who reject the concept of marriage, with the most ferocity.”
I have a lot of family in Sweden and religous marriage is seen as anachronistic, common law marriage is the norm.
The demographic issues are simply being papered over by immigration (including internal EU population movements from the East and South).
“Muslim women have very low OOW birth rates, make up an increasingly large part of Europe’s population, and are the only people in Europe who seem to be reproducing at or above replacement level.”
Only for Muslim born abroad (and the figures are only slightly higher). Muslims born in the West have the same as or lower birth rates than ethnic Westerners.
Aaron:
Not true.
http://www.scb.se/statistik/_publikationer/BE0701_2008A01_BR_BE51BR0802.pdf
Look at page 17 for example.
“France, UK and Sweden being better off in terms of fertiliy rate is a myth. It’s caused by large muslim immigrant populations”
This is definitely not true.
Here’s a very detailed white paper about fertility in France, which shows “The fertility of immigrants contributes little to the level of fertility in France.”: http://www.demographic-research.org/volumes/vol19/16/19-16.pdf
Here’s an equally good paper on the UK that shows the same thing: http://iussp2009.princeton.edu/papers/93139
I can’t find a study specific to Sweden, but given the above two I strongly suspect the same is true there as well.
Generally, there just aren’t *that* many immigrants that their slightly higher fertility rates could boost the national total fertility rates. Plus, fertility rates of immigrants quickly converge to that of the society they immigrant to.
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If this is Tuesday it must be Belgium. It is both understandable and inevitable that Americans merely see Europe (wherever that may be) as on the other side of Pond and thus a mirror image of The United States, such that Germany is to France as Massachusetts is to Maine: It isn’t – unless you are paid-up eurocrat. As everyone knows England thinks that it is situate fifty miles off Chesapeake Bay!
It is hardly surprising that with so many countries – none larger than the State of Texas (unless one counts Russia) and some hardly larger than an American county – Monaco or Andorra or Gibraltar – which last is metaphorically twinned with Las Malvinas, and thus somewhere in the South Atlantic – that confusion can reign. The last thing we need in Olde England is an increasing birth-rate, there is no room never mind schools, hospitals, nor infrastructure. The fact that 85% of the land is Rural is not the point – we still need to grow food, and need woods in which to walk and mountains to climb – yet even so, last year our population rose by 400,000, that is to say by just under 1%, and most of that was from new births – and it cannot all be from immigrants – not all of whom are by any means middle-eastern or west-indian.
The wilfully single mother is, I believe, a rarity, sympathised with even as she is shunned. Is she really anything new? Was the period of modernity from say 1830-1970 something of an aberration, in its tightly-intact marriages and within-wedlock births? Certainly London no longer has 10% of its females on the game and one will not get propositioned as one walks The Strand (or indeed anywhere else) as was the case two hundred or more years ago. Is society collapsing? I perhaps live a sheltered existence and I have no statistics but I do not really see signs of that. Most divorcees, male and female, merely regroup with someone new, which doubtless has its advantages as much as its disadvantages. Todays empowered Corporate Cubicle worker is merely the Courtesan of times past.
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What might be reducing marriage in Sweeden (and much of Europe in general) are the economies that are equalized. With such massive taxes paid on income and such huge government benefits for those who are not taxes, there simply isn’t the incentive (on the part of women) to marry. What kind of ‘status’ does a woman having marrying a man where 2/3rds of his paycheck simply go to government when she can marry ANY MAN (at any salary level) or marry government the way single moms do here in the States and get an equalized lifestyle living anywhere? She gets no edge over any other woman no matter what she does (marry or not marry.)
An equalized society that is increasingly abssent of Christianity really throws a monkey wrench into Western Culture because so many norms and customs that we are all used to go bye-bye simply because they are not needed.
“proof that intact families don’t really matter”
Only if parents don’t give a shit about the well being of their kids.
Trying to rationalize dysfunction does not speak well of a given society.
One Swedish guy I used to work with had four children with four different women. When I asked him how he managed to handle that, he deadpanned “I don’t. The state does.” And he proceeded to explain the cradle-to-grave Swedish welfare system and how women controlled everything. If they wanted to fuck you and have a child, they would fuck you and have a child. If you stuck around all the better, but if you didn’t, well, don’t let the door hit you on the way out, the State comes to the rescue!
I wasn’t a full-on red piller yet, so I failed to grasp the significance of that. Now I do.
The prosperity of their economies is a big, big factor. The less prosperous the economy, the more traditional society tends to be, and vice versa. Feminism is a luxury. Scandinavia has plenty of natural resources, with which they can finance their gigantic welfare states, and indirectly promote certain lifestyles that would poorly suit countries like Italy or Greece, where intact families are important to survival.
The marriage rate is going to continue to drop, so these debates about whether it is good or bad that children are born out-of-wedlock is largely a academic debate since the institution of marriage is slowly fading from our culture, except for the very religious or the upper-middle class and above. Thus, It is clear that there will be a “new normal” in the future where the old nuclear family is less and less common.
A slightly different take, Jay… “these debates about whether it is good or bad that children are born out-of-wedlock is largely an academic debate” — because there is nothing you can do married (v2) that you can’t do unmarried, other than say you’re married.
Thus, married/unmarried is a distinction without a difference, so everything that shows up in whatever graphs one cares to construct on this or any other related topic is simply spurious IME.
@Martian Bachelor:
I am not married and I haven’t looked into the issue, but aren’t there tax benefits to being married? If so, that is one difference. Needless to say, the tax benefits to being married are not enough to compensate for the fact that marriage is a bad deal all around.
As far as the out-of-wedlock birth ratio in Sweden, it was 54.3% in 2011; nowhere near 80%. The out-of-wedlock birth ratio is higher in France than it is in Sweden (55.8% in 2011). In 1980 Sweden’s out-of-wedlock birth ratio was 39.7% while in France it was 11.4%. Times have changed since 1980. Sweden was an outlier of high out-of-wedlock births in 1980; now it is merely above average.
The broader issue here seems to be whether out-of-wedlock birth ratio is a good indicator of family breakdown in international comparisons. I have heard there is more non-marital cohabitation in Europe than there is in the United States so that Europe’s out-of-wedlock birth ratios are inflated compared to the United States. In the United States non-marital births indicate single parents; in Europe not so much. If you look at particular countries though deterioration compared to the past is the rule so overall deterioration is happening even if the out-of-wedlock birth ratio overstates Europe’s family problems from the American point of view.
As far as America being an outlier in terms of proportion of children not living with both parents; this is only true for all races combined. Looking at American non-Hispanic whites separately the proportion not living with both parents isn’t so bad compared to Europe. Also it should be kept in mind; America’s minority populations have worse family indicators than the white population. In Europe this is reversed where the immigrant populations have better family indicators than the white native populations.
In 2006 72.7% of non-Hispanic white children ages 12 to 14 years old lived with both parents. This is the data point most comparable to the European comparison data. This is from America’s Families and Living Arrangements Table C3. For all children 12 to 14 years old 65.3% lived with both parents.
It is interesting to note that among all children 12 to 14 years old 65.3% lived with both parents in 2006 and 65.6% lived with both parents in 2012. Actual improvement in this indicator was seen from 2006 to 2012 in the United States.
Note to Dalrock: Below is a way you can get out-of-wedlock birth ratios for all the European Countries for any specific year or date range from 1960 to the present (2012).
Go to:
Eurostat Home Page
Statistics
Population and Social Conditions – Population
Database
Direct link to Database Page:
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/population/data/database
Once you are on Database page choose the following options; follow the below instructions.
Demography – National Data
Fertility
Fertility indicators
Proportion of Live Births Outside Marriage is the default; Total Fertility Rate and other indicators can be chosen from drop down menu
There is a TIME option at top left; click on the plus sign. You will be taken to a page where you can select your time range. Years available are 1960 to the present (currently 2012). Select your data range or specific year. After you have selected your year or years click Update in the upper right.
You now have your data set. There is a Download option at the top. You can download into Excel or other formats. Choosing Full Extraction is the most logical choice.
Sam: It’s the same in Sweden, as shown in the study I linked to. The study is in Swedish, but there are English translations at the most important places.
The American figures are worse than they appear. Having a “father” in the home is loosely interpreted, which means that pretty much any man shacking up with the female is considered a “father.”
Europe is not perfect, but in regards to biological fathers having an ongoing relationship with their children it is far, far better on almost every metric. The number of American children who have no relationship to speak of with their biological father far exceeds that of any Western European country. Even Eastern Europe is better in that regard. The US is decidedly retrograde – essentially barbaric – when it comes to father involvement. And this is entirely deliberate, as Hanna Rosin’s new article in The Atlantic about working class men as crime victims makes clear.
GBFM, it took you this long to discover the Antigoines?
Who do not exist in the USA because the only place you can find 20 odd women that cute together does not exist.
There are a couple of separate issues going on here. How do these states compare on these issues. The first is the rights of children. The second is rights of men.
Which states are closer to recognizing the rights of children to live Full Time with their father?
And which states are closer to recognizing the rights of men to have complete control over the fruits of their labor?
As far as the United States are concerned, a mother can use the government to force a separation between father and children, backed up by violent police action if necessary. The United States are totally disregarding the rights of children to have full access to their father at all times. All the benefits that children receive from their fathers (except money) are on a part time basis. Even 50% custody deprives children of seeing their father 50% of the time. Children are especially vulnerable when they lack the protection aspect of fatherhood, because the state is blocking fathers from protecting their children 50% of the time. Children deserve their fathers protection 100% of the time.
And in any of the United States, the government is a higher authority above men in regards to their property. Men may only do with their property those thing that the government has approved them to do. Men in any of the United States are not masters of their own houses. They pay rent to government on their houses. They are restricted by zoning laws. If they are in business, they are subservient to regulations. The rights of men in the United States to form contracts by voluntary agreement has been nullified by the activist courts.
By no stretch of the imagination are the United States less socialist than the european states. Socialism is Central Control of the economy.
Where are children safer? Under the authority of the state? Or under the authority of the family?
Do Swedish men have to pay alimony? How is child support calculated?
I saw a documentary.about Ingmar Bergman recently.and apparently he was married 4 times and had a whole bunch of kids that he rarely saw. He admitted that he wasn’t a good family man, but it sounded like he was left alone and not forced to ger involved.
i have no idea what the set up is over there, but i call tell you that Swedish women are nicer than women in the Anglosphere, even if they chase the same men as those women. i.e tall good looking alphas.
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@Alex
“”he proceeded to explain the cradle-to-grave Swedish welfare system and how women controlled everything. If they wanted to fuck you and have a child, they would fuck you and have a child. If you stuck around all the better, but if you didn’t, well, don’t let the door hit you on the way out, the State comes to the rescue!””
No need to look at Sweden.This is Canada!
I am amazed to find this site where men are actually complaining about the destruction of marriage and the family. I have assumed that the “sexual revolution” in which women have been told they need not bother to transform male lust into love, homes, and families nor bother to link men to specific children would be welcomed by all men. I did not realize that the unintended consequence was most men simply being left on the sidelines while a few men hoard all of the women. I do not think most women are happy with the current feral dating environment and the resulting chaos. They are just trying to adapt to the current reward system. The “feminists” are also not the main villains here. The “alpha males”, for lack of a better term, that lead our society are perfectly happy with things as they are. The feminists are merely followers/useful idiots of the alpha males. Why don’t some of you men in the Manosphere speak out in places where the message can be heard by people other than this echo chamber? If you can reign in your anger and hatred toward women and speak to them without the vulgar generalizations, I think you would be surprised to find that most are unhappy with the current state of affairs.
I am from Southern Europe (I live in Latin America) and I have been thinking about the differences between Europe and America with respect to gender relationships for years. I am positive that Sweden is NOT representative of Europe, not even of Northern Europe. Due to historical reasons (e.g, the country didn’t participate in World War II), Sweden is the paradise of political correctness. For example, Germany is much more traditional than Sweden.
I think they are four differences between Europe and America:
1. European people are theoretical more progressive than American people (for example, support to feminism, gay marriage and much less religiosity). But, in practice, they are much more traditional, especially when it comes to monogamy. Excepting minority groups (gays), most people pair-bond and remain together for a lifetime. Of course, there is divorce but there is not as prevalent as America.
American people are always talking about God and family values (don’t get me wrong: I am Catholic) but it’s only paying lip service to them. For example:
– Going to church and having a personal relationship of Jesus, doesn’t prevent them for fornicate, divorce and ass-rape the ex in family court.
– They talk and talk and talk about family values but, when the kid is 18, they are eager to send him to college and be free from him. In Europe, I have seen people remaining at home well into their 30s. They talk about family values but, if a job pays more, they are happy to travel 2000 miles and break contact with their family. In Europe, people stays close to their homeland so family bonds not break the way they do in America and tradition is transmitted through these family lines. (When I say retired people moving to Florida to spend their last years, it is like seeing aliens from outer space. An European old man/woman won’t trade being close to their grandchildren for some good weather and good fields of golf).
So European people are, in practice, more traditional (in average). American people have always been more “modern”. The history explains that: the Pilgrims rejected traditional (Anglican) religion when they moved to America, the States were populated by people who decided to break with their families and cultures in Europe and start fresh in the New World.
The fact that American people have so many immigrants goes against the idea of tradition too. This is why the powers that be are trying to import so many immigrants into Europe, to break our tradition, our sense of community and be able to manipulate us more easily.
2. This lack of tradition is the greatest strength of America and its last weakness
I won’t speak about the strength because everybody knows it (American people is always trying to innovate, invent and create companies so they are the First Power – who invented the Internet, for example?).
The weakness is that any person can be broadcasted on the TV saying nonsense and everybody accepts it as a new idea (the myth of progress is prevalent in the States) and it is quickly adopted. This is why things like sexual harassment has been so prevalent in America and barely existent in Europe. Fat acceptance, polyamory, “Eat, pray, love”, frivorce, bad food, “follow your bliss”, promiscuity. All this memes don’t take root in Europe, because most people behave according to the tradition (while paying lip service to progressive values).
When Charles Murray explains in “Coming Apart” that white elites in America proclaim progressive values while living with traditional sexual and family mores, most European people behave like these white American elites.
The lack of tradition makes that American people measure themselves with respect what you see in mass media. This inflates their expectations and makes them miserable. When your source of advice is not your grandma but Opprah, it is positive that you are not going to end up happy.
3. The welfare state is different
I thought the welfare state in Europe was much bigger than in America, but now I doubt it. The problem is, while in America the money is investing in making possible for people to live without working (black ghettos, anyone?), at least in Southern Europe the money is invested in education and healthcare for everybody so you don’t have the “Welfare queens”.
In addition, there are a lot of jobs in the Administration. Many women end up as a civil servants which is a cushy job which allows them to make compatible family and work. This is one of the reasons why feminism is not that angry here. Since people live nearby their families, the grandparents (and other relatives) are happy to take care of the children so you are not hearing people screaming: “free childcare!”.
4. Last but not least, there is no pedestalization
This was one of the greatest insights I’ve had. In Europe, there is no pedestalization. Women are not considered goddesses superior to men and men don’t appear on TV saying: “I don’t know why my wife loves me. I don’t deserve her. My life would be such a mess without her”. This is laughable and people would mock such a wimp. They would also mock women saying they are goddesses. The sense of ridicule is strong in Europe (In America, it is very rare, I have seen sixty y.o. fatties performing as majorettes just in front of the Alamo while my European female friends were laughing their ass off).
Women in Europe don’t think they deserve a handsome wealthy prince just because they are women. They are more realistic so they are happier. Clotaire Rapaille says, in “The Culture Code”, that love in America means “high expectations”. Since unhappiness is the difference between expectations and reality, American women are going to end up with much misery.
(Comment: When I talk about America, I talk about the States in which I lived for some time)
@imnobodyoo (Strange screenname, by the way)
You are pretty much correct, although the Episcopalians (Anglicans) were the “Republican party at prayer” in the mid 20th century, it was subsequently thrown away when liberal reforms were made at the General Convention of 1976. The Episcopalians who didn’t want to go along started the Continuing Anglican movement ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuing_Anglican_movement ) and for those interested there are approx. 400 parishes in North America.
Europe will undoubtedly go through some hard times as they are replacing their own population via non-white immigration and assimilation… Whatever tradition they have held is already at risk. But, you are right in that the U.S. is a very “low church” country, which means very aggressive, but does not emphasize tradition as much. I wish the U.S. and Europe could trade the best ideas… that is something that may be happening since the advent of the internet.
Best regards,
A.J.P.
@AJP
Yes, my nick is a bit weird. I want to emphasize that it’s not me who matters but my ideas (whether they are good or they are bad). It’s kind of preemptive move against ad-hominem attacks and shaming language. Of course, it is borrowed from the Oddissey http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Why_did_Odysseus_tell_the_cyclops_his_name_was_Nobody
I agree with you except in US and Europe trading the best ideas. It seems to me that they trade the worst ideas.
In Europe, we adopt your promiscuity, your multicultural society and your fast food, but we don’t adopt your strong work ethics, your ability to innovate and create new businesses and your honesty (I remember living in US and the mailman left my Amazon packages outside my home so everybody could steal them. But they were still there where I got home at night: don’t try this in Europe).
In America, you adopt our godlessness and progressive ideas but you don’t import our way of preaching liberal and behaving conservative (maybe you are too honest).
Best regards,
Reblogged this on oogenhand and commented:
Nice comparisons between Europe and America.
imno- words like ‘progressive’ stand on flimsy ground… things can be progressively improved or progressively worse or progressively inane or progressively meaningful. More importantly things can be progressively more agreeable with my mindset or progressively disagreeable. Of course, I’ll only call that which is progressively agreeable progress. But most of things called ‘progressive’ in the 20th and 21st centuries seem to be in truth regressive. If the nineteenth century was when man progressed beyond feudalism, the 20th and 21st centuries are when man started regressing back towards feudalism (called Marxism, socialism, and many other magic flowery words… but in the end feudalism). Progressives use the word progress to describe the march to feudalism. That seems a bit contradictory to me.
> Given the continuing fall in out of wedlock birth rates, the results
> will certainly look worse for adolescents ten and fifteen years from now. (OP)
Didn’t you mean rise?
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First of all, excellent assembly of data!
Second, unfortunately I’m late to the party, but of course it’s worth to note that “intact families” don’t matter as much as you seem to think, since parenting and the broad family environment (including the presence or absence of one or the other parent) has no impact on how children turn out. This is a robust finding from behavioral genetic data, so concerns over the collapse of two-parent families is over blown.
See:
All Human Behavioral Traits are Heritable | JayMan’s Blog
Taming the “Tiger Mom” and Tackling the Parenting Myth « JayMan’s Blog
And see the comments at: Mangan’s: Are fathers necessary?
It’s worth noting that the U.S. appears to be a bit of an outlier – for unsurprising reasons (greater population of “Sun People”).
@tz:
Based on what evidence? As you will see, the evidence doesn’t support this view.
Perhaps. But wouldn’t those Whites be different? (Think Charles Murray.)
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I think living with “Both biological Parents” gives a better number. A woman with an out of wedlock child may go through 5 cohabiting relationships by age 18. Your data is not for Adolescents living with both biological parents.
Only 37% of children are living with both biological parents. This means that the 71% of children live with 2 parents is a bit misleading.
http://tinyurl.com/unstablefamilies
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-real-class-warfare/2012/02/24/gIQALdFdcR_story.html
This is a great thing for a single guy but a terrible thing for the kid.
Many single moms do not make enough to pay rent- this leads to their living in unsafe neighborhoods. 50% of single moms struggle to pay rent- rents take more than 1/3 of their pay check. This is based on my personal experience where I have had single moms trying to move in within 1 week to 4 weeks of the first date. Single moms being easy lay is absolutely true. One trip to ToysRUs to tell her that you love her kid, and a couple of movies- she will offer to move in …
ToysRUs was the first retailer to implement the feature of allowing split payments using multiple credit cards.
Some of the single moms were formerly married- and I myself am divorced- so I am in no position to criticize anyone.
As a consultant, I usually maintain two apartments- an apartment at client location is cheaper than a hotel. So I have had 2 single mom girlfriends living with me for over 4 years. Not the same 2 single moms- but a revolving set.
Very hard to give up this life….
Hello,
liked the post. I can confirm several guesses in the comments: I am from Europe, live with my partner and our child and we are not married even though for all practical uses we are (some people even think we are).
Neither of us wants to marry, both of us would be willing to marry if the other insisted. We just don´t take the institution seriously (neither of us is religious).
My reasons for not marrying:
1) For lack of a credible authority performing the ceremony (why the hell would I have a deputy deputy something from the city telling me what I am to do?) The trust to the institutions is very eroded because I´m in an ex-comunist country.
2) The divorce is so easy that it undermines the credibility of marriage. You can skip it and save the trouble. Nothing changes, the marriage is not really binding unless you are a believer (being religious is not enough, you have to really believe).
It seems like the only reason people marry is so that the woman can be a princess for one day.
3) To protect my children from the risks of my business. If I am married, the wealth is shared: If I make a debt, my wife and children can be taken accountable for it. If we´re not married, It´s my mess and my family is protected from negative consequences of my potential failures. Same goes for her business.
The legal benefits of marriage for children can be arranged easily by other contracts (a will, life insurance etc.). This is by far the strongest reason since I am self employed and even though they are not high, the risks exist.
Maybe the main difference between US and Europe is in the motivation to divorce: there is no great advantage in divorcing where I live. Women cannot get very rich that way and as a rule a divorced mother is not as well off as a married mother in most cases. The alimony for a woman is extremely rare and the child support is not very high (it´s country specific of course). Women generally can get better money from the father by staying with him or, even if they do divorce/separate, they often can agree with him on a higher payment than the court would grant.
If a divorce improves the financial situation of the woman, it is rarely so because of the settlement, rather as a side benefit (like the marriage really was problematic, e.g. the man was a drunk/gambler and cost more than he brought in or she can get a richer man once divorced).
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What differs here are laws surrounding divorce in Europe and welfare.
Sweden has long been the Socialist beloved Utopia envisaged by Leftists. For a while, it seemed that the combination of generous welfare, high tax plus high government investment in local industries made Sweden – tiny by world population standards – punch above it’s weight. It had at least 6 multinational companies: Volvo, Saab-Scania, Astra Pharmaceuticals, Pharmacia, Electrolux Ericsson. The population was homogeneous due to restricted immigration and bolstered by welfare being targeted at the newborn (up to late 1990s replacement rate was 2.3 per female), with 2 years’ paid maternity and paternity leave.
Enter a series of soft-headed liberal governments who denigrated the family, promoted feminism, called everyone ”racist” and opened the borders. Now welfare is extended to hostile uneducated migrants, who cannot replace aging workers in a high-tech economy. Taxes became so high multinationals have left, reducing the tax base further.
Sweden once was the world’s 7th largest economy, an impressive feat. It is now 15th and will be 40th by 2030, behind Libya and Greece.
Societies don’t evolve (nor, incidentally, does anything, but that’s another story). Rather, they DE-volve. Looser marital bonds and the dissolution of marriage will lead to a return to the Herd and the Harem, especially as economics increasingly polarises / stratifies.
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