Don't Do Things You Can't Afford

Matt Walsh writes a lot of good stuff. I follow him on Twitter. I haven't listened to his podcasts or read his book. Every once in a while, I disagree with what he writes, and this is one of those times. [This is bumped up from May 2017.]

This time, Walsh wrote to encourage people to go ahead and have children young. Walsh is greatly disturbed that so many people his age are still living with a parent, but even if they're not, he's still bothered that they're not marrying, and not having children. And it probably bothers him a lot (though he doesn't say it in this column) that most of them are fornicating and/or masturbating.

I generally do think people should move out of their parents' home when they finish with college or before, but it doesn't bother me in the slightest that people are not marrying and not having children.

I was 27 and broke when we had kids.

And that was irresponsible of Walsh.

They were twins, so we became a family of four right out of the gate. We didn’t really know anybody where we lived, and we were about 600 miles from the nearest family member.

Bad planning.

I wasn’t making much money at my job, we had nothing in savings, and we were pretty far in the red because of medical bills and my wife’s student loan debt.

This is what you SHOULD NOT DO, kids.

...it’s clear that we were not in what our society would consider the “ideal” position to get married or have kids. We weren’t ready. We couldn’t afford it. And yet we did get married and we did have kids.

Which was irresponsible.

And here we are. All of us (five of us now). Still breathing, somehow.

Yes, it is called debt, handouts from family, and, for a lot of people, public assistance in one form or another. If Walsh avoided all three of these things, I'd be very surprised.

My generation has been stuck in neutral for years, not wanting to get married, not wanting to have kids, refusing to move out of mom’s house and be adults, always insisting that we aren’t “ready.”

People can be living on their own and still not want to get married and even if they do want to marry, still not want to have kids.

Dennis Prager Doesn't Understand Putting Financial Stability Before Getting Married

On the Male/Female Hour of his show today (Wednesday, February 3, 2021), Dennis Prager again took the opportunity to try to sell people on marrying by bringing up how people, especially men, will say they don't want to marry until they have financial stability, and claiming he's never heard a good explanation for that. [This entry us bumped up because it is still relevant.]

I was hoping for some callers would do what I recommended here. One sounded like he might. [Dennis isn’t doing his show since he had a spinal cord injury.]

I wish I could call in, but I can't. At least not yet. 

Most men shouldn't marry at all, but if they are going to do something so foolish, they should definitely not marry until they have financial stability. There are many reasons this is so. In no particular order, here are just some reasons as to why:

• Marriage is difficult enough. It is even more so when you're poor. Finances are one of THE most common reasons spouse fight and people get divorced. 
• People trying to reach financial stability have less time and energy to spend on a spouse.
• Men who are better off financially can get a more attractive wife.
• Why should you take on another person's debts? Why should they take on yours?
• Wealth acquired before the marriage can be more easily protected from divorce than wealth acquired during the marriage.
• Most women want to marry a man who can support them.
• If kids are a possibility, it is best they have a parent raise them, not have both parents unavailable and tired out from working jobs.

Rather than further repeat myself more, see what I wrote here and go ahead and look through the Dennis Prager tag on this blog. 

Dennis Prager, being unmarried is the default. MEN DO NOT NEED A REASON TO AVOID MARRIAGE. Instead, they need a good reason TO get married, and most men don't have one!

Dennis Prager Gets a Call From A Clueless Woman, Pushes Marriage

During the open lines third hour of today's Dennis Prager Show (October 4, 2019), he got a call from  "Anne in Dallas". I really wish Anne would have called Dr. Laura instead. [This entry has been bumped up. I wonder how "Anne" is doing now?]

Anne was never asked, and never directly revealed, whether or not she has children, wants children, or her age. She did indicate that she's been looking for a traditional husband (= walking ATM) for many years. There was no indication she has ever been married before (sounds like she hasn't) or if she'd been riding the carousel until she got religion.

But she's dating a 48 year-old man "off and on" for two years who has been married three times already, the longest marriage being four years.

Right there, Dr. Laura probably would have laughed and her and then hung up.

Emptying the Nest

Many commentators I admire are aghast that so many parents allow their adult children to continue to live with them or allow them to move back in with them (such as after college). This is seen as part of what is making them "snowflakes".

The idea is that since children become legal adults at age 18, they should be out on their own at that age (and if they are done with high school or should be), and it is only allowable for them to continue to live at home, if it is at all, if they are going to college full time and, perhaps, also working part time. Dr. Laura also makes it clear they have to be following house rules, especially when it comes to not fornicating or allowing a boyfriend or girlfriend to stay over. The adult children are to be kicked out and all material/financial support ceased if it is known that such a rule has been violated. (If the parents do have such a rule Dr. Laura will tell them they should.)

Some parents hear this and are surprised, because they think it would be good for their adult children to live at home to build up financial stability rather than having to share a dump with roommates and struggle.

Dr. Laura sees virtue in that struggle, and she cites her own experiences at that age.

There's a potential problem citing the past, however.

You Should Be Saving, Not Spending More

This LiveScience.com story says that a recession may cause women to splurge on shopping like they are addicts looking for a fix.

In times of crisis, women are more likely to take a shopping spree than in normal times.

That doesn't bode well for her personal finances, or for those of the guy who is paying her bills.

A new survey finds almost half of UK women are frightened or scared by the recession, and 45 percent felt their financial situation had taken a hit. A full 75 percent said they would be making cutbacks.

Yet 79 percent of them said they would splurge to cheer themselves up.

And what about eating more bon-bons? Nothing like adding extra weight to go along with your extra debt!

Of the 700 women surveyed, 40 percent said depression was an excuse to overspend; 60 percent said "feeling a bit low" was a good enough reason.

They are wrong. Browsing is one thing. Buying is another.

"This type of spending, or compensatory consumption, serves as a way of regulating intense emotions," said Karen Pine, a University of Hertfordshire professor and author of "Sheconomics" (Headline Publishing Group, 2009).

What's wrong with sex – if you're married, or exercise or a non-destructive hobby?

The problem is likely not confined to women.

They have to throw that in to avoid charges of sexism.

A 2006 study in the United States found 6 percent of women have it so bad they are labeled compulsive buyers, but so are 5.5 percent of men.

So more than one out of every 20 people you come across is labeled a compulsive buyer. What about the people who aren't labeled "compulsive" but either are compulsive or are otherwise buying stuff they don't need or can't afford? Does anyone believe that just as many men fall into that category?

Pine says this compensatory behavior could become more pronounced in a recession. People use drugs and alcohol similarly to regulate emotions, Pine explains, but she thinks shopping is increasingly employed by women for this purpose. And, paradoxically, worrying about money could lead women to spend more, she said.

I'm sure if any single guy is reading this, he'll feel really motivated to find a woman with whom to join finances.

"Or, perhaps worse still, if they can't spend we might see an increase in mental health problems such as anxiety and depression."

Oh, great. You get to choose between dealing with more debt or more emotional difficulty.

One of the things I think a couple should do when a marriage proposal seems eminent is get full access to each other’s financial records – credit report, credit card statements, bank statements, investment accounts, etc. That will make it easier to tell if there is a spending problem, or any number of other problems. Full disclosure should be a stipulation of the pre-nup.

Weddings Don’t Have to Mean Debt

Andrea Chang of the Los Angeles Times wrote an article about keeping wedding costs down.

Wedding costs can be outrageous. Every dollar spent on the wedding is more than a dollar that you won’t have down the road during the marriage – to spend on a home, or a car, or education, or retirement, or medical care, or insurance, or a vacation.

A typical bride-to-be, Katrina Macrae has bought a dress, browsed different varieties of flowers and settled on a date and location for her April nuptials.

But her bridal gown is actually an ivory-colored prom dress that she picked up for $160. The flowers will be purchased wholesale from the flower district in downtown Los Angeles the day before the wedding. And she's getting married to her fiance, Scott Smith, on a Sunday, when location fees are usually cheaper.

My wife also found in inexpensive – but very beautiful – dress, and got the flowers wholesale.

At a time when the average wedding costs about $30,000, Macrae, of Redondo Beach, plans to spend $8,000.

$30,000 – and that’s for average. That’s probably taking into account those quickie civil ceremonies. Some people spend much more than $30,000 on the flowers alone. Ridiculous. We beat the average, thankfully, and still had the wedding in a beautiful church on a Saturday.

Then, in April, she was laid off from her job at an architectural firm because of the cooling housing market, and Turner said she realized more than ever that a wedding shouldn't mean "starting your life off with debt."

That is true even in an economic boom.

And when Turner learned she'd have to fork over $4.25 per guest for a cake-cutting fee, she scrapped plans for a wedding cake and ordered cupcakes.

Good for her! I attended a wedding where the bride and groom had a small cake of their own, and everyone else got some of several sheet cakes from Costco. Good move.

There’s a paradox in our current culture that has elevated weddings while degrading marriage. The wedding day has always been the bride’s big day (you don’t see Modern Groom magazine on many coffee tables, do you?), and so the tradition that her parents pay for the wedding made some sense. Now, as people have their weddings later in life, they tend to pay more for their own. Since women tend to marry men who earn more than they do, what this really means is that the groom is paying for the bride’s party. Her day to wear an expensive dress she’ll never wear again. Her day to be the center of attention. Her day to have flowers everywhere, that will die in mere days. Plus to even get there, he has to buy her an expensive diamond and gold ring.

We’ve turned weddings into an excuse to throw parties and get gifts and then go on a vacation.

And then there are weddings where I have to wonder why the groom is even bothering. If they are already shacking up, why, other than the parties and gifts, should they bother to get married? And get married in a church, no less? I know why some guys do this – they are afraid she’s going to leave without a wedding. The thing is, if they were shacking up for a while, chances are she’s going to leave anyway, or rather kick him out - or so the statistics would have us believe. Only post-wedding, he’ll be obligated to pay her alimony.

Let’s not forget the bachelorette parties, either, which, from what I understand, tend to get raunchier than bachelor parties. Why bother to get married if you value your intended so little that you’ll participate in some of those shenanigans? Just stay single and enjoy those shenanigans whenever you want to. I firmly asserted that I would not have stippers, "dancers", prostitutes, porn films, or any related stuff of that sort in my pre-wedding festivities, and despite prodding from some of the guys, I insisted on sticking to that.

We should celebrate marriage with nice weddings, but we should also celebrate marriage in other ways – like saving sex and living together for marriage. But how many of us do that? Attending a wedding used to mean pledging, as a witness, to support that covenant. It wasn't just a party and a meal.

Finally… since weddings are really about the bride, and since more often the groom is the one paying for it, I think most of these guys should see if they can get a pre-nup that will take the costs of the wedding – with interest – out of any money she gets in the event of a divorce – especially if she is the one who files for divorce. Not sure if such a stipulation would stick.