I was reading an article and it says that married men benefit the most out of marriage. I was wondering how women would benefit less.
Do women benefit from marriage less than men?
I noticed the current replies aren't exactly based on empirical evidence, so I'm going to explain using solely research findings as I'm pretty familiar with the studies these articles typically reference. I just have adhd, have access to my uni's library, and hyper-focused on this topic once lmao.
For starters, these studies examine levels of happiness and overall satisfaction in life and look at four demographics: single women, married women, single men, and married men. Of these four groups, single women experience the highest levels of happiness and most overall satisfaction with their lives while single men report the lowest levels of happiness and are generally the most unsatisfied with their lives. Another study looking at human lifespan shows that single women live the longest, while single men die the earliest.
Thus, the findings show that the decision to get married has vastly different outcomes for men and women, since a woman who decides to get married loses years of her life, experiences less overall happiness and less satisfaction in life while a man who decides to get married is gaining years to his life and is increasing his happiness and satisfaction in life. Therefore, it appears to researchers that women benefit the least from marriage when we're using these factors as measurement.
When we look at the reasons why, I think it can be boiled down to the fact that married women have more responsibilities than their single counterparts (and therefore more stress), less time for themselves, and less time for their friendships. Of course, there's a multitude of factors and each of those factors may affect each marriage differently, but we're looking at the big picture here, so let's break it down.
Regarding increased responsibilities for married women: studies show that women spend 50% more time on household responsibilities than men do despite working the same amount of hours at work, outside of the home. Those responsibilities include cooking, cleaning, parenting, and caring for other adults in the home (either the husband himself, or any elderly who may be living with the family). Further, in families where the husband and wife share the responsibilities 50/50, women are still doing more by taking on something referred to as the "mental load" which comes along with managing the household. Even if the husband and wife share the tasks evenly, the wife is typically responsible for the "invisible labour" of managing household tasks, examining the house to identify tasks which need to be done, delegating those tasks, and then reminding others to do said tasks, as well as keeping track of family events (birthdays, family gatherings, extracurricular activities, etc.) and preparing for those events (buying gifts, preparing food, reminding family of events, etc.). Aside from this, wives also tend to take on the responsibility of managing their husband's health by ensuring he eats healthy foods, goes to his dentist appointments, keeping track of any changes in health, acting as his personal therapist, and forcing him to go to the hospital in cases where he otherwise wouldn't. This is a big one, as single men tend to be at higher risk of death due to preventable and/or lifestyle-related illnesses simply bc they didn't go to the hospital earlier.
Less time for themselves: with all the increased responsibilities that come along with marriage and family, a married woman typically has less time to devote to exercise, diet, hobbies, interests, solitude, etc.
Less time for friendships: honestly, people really underestimate the importance of friendship and community to a person's overall health. Humans are social creatures, and even if you're an antisocial person, having a sense of community and having strong friendships are beneficial to overall happiness, satisfaction, and longevity. Female friendships are especially beneficial as they tend to have more emotional depth and vulnerability than male friendships which are typically pretty surface-level, and this is key in understanding the importance of this. For men, their wives typically become their best friend, the closest friend they've ever had, and their wives become their number one source of emotional support. Single men typically won't have a relationship this emotionally fulfilling outside of marriage, and are the loneliest of all four demographics, but this isn't true for women who have deep, vulnerable, emotionally fulfilling friendships throughout their entire lives regardless of whether they get married or not.
I even wondered if the responsibility of parenting was a reason for the discrepancy in beneficial outcomes for married or unmarried men and women, but nope, according to the research parents live longer than childless people too. If parenthood isn't the issue, then it brings us back, once again, to the increased responsibilities that come alone with marriage. And, coming from a health science background, stress is a major factor in overall health, and it just seems that married women have more stress than the four demographics looked at in these studies.
All that being said, I still plan on getting married because a lot of these issues are preventable. There's a reason emotional intelligence in men is the most important indicator in whether a marriage will be successful or not. Emotionally intelligent men might be more rare, but they exist, and they're much more attentive to the needs of their partners, they're better at self-reflection and self-awareness, they strive for equality and true partnership. Any successful marriage requires work, but the excess work women are taking on is entirely avoidable if their husbands simply managed the household more effectively, if they took on an equal share of the tasks, if they participated in parenting more, and encouraged their wives to upkeep their hobbies, interests, and social circles.
Anyway, sorry for the novel. I did days and days of research and never had any use for it aside from personal knowledge lmao.
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- 449 opinions shared on Marriage & Weddings topic.
Married women have a lot of stress compared to single women cuz they basically become slaves to their husband's and do everything to care for them. The husband's are getting the better benefits cuz they are being cared for by their wives 24/7
The author of an article can write literally anything they want. Did they provide links to peer reviewed and published empirical evidence? I doubt it. I’ve never seen such evidence, likely because it doesn’t exist. Divorce is big business though. How many millions or billions of dollars are being generated by convincing women that they’re getting shafted in their marriage while KNOWING they can destroy their husbands in divorce? How many women do you know can work themselves into a frenzy over rhetoric alone? Consider that article “economic stimulus”. Ell oh ell!
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no. women benefit more from marriage than men.
a man's role in a marriage is static and based on duty. if he doesn't want to take out the trash or confront the home intruder, he's either seen as a loser or a coward.
a woman's role in a marriage is negotiable and based on her feelings. if she doesn't want to cook or clean, telling her to do so is oppressive and misogynistic.
then there's divorce which favors women entirely even if she's the one to cheat or let herself go.
What Girls & Guys Said
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21Opinion
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The person who wrote that article knows absolutely nothing about marriage if they actually think that women benefit from marriage less than men.
Just compare the suicide rates for married men and married women, and tell me what's the higher one.
In our Western culture, men are expected to be the provider figure within households, which is a very stressful role by itself, and we aren't expected to get even emotional support from our wives. Additionally, we are expected to help with all the house chores despite having to be the provider. It's frankly insane.
- 549 opinions shared on Marriage & Weddings topic.
Women don't benefit much from marriage unlike men assuming he gets a good woman/wife.
According to the Bible the man gains favor from God getting a wife, the woman doesn't get the favor.
She's the gift and the blessing, not the man.
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Women benefit more especially after the divorce. Sign a prenup dude.
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Honestly, who cares? All that matters is, "are YOU better off married to a person or not?" If the answer is "yes" then get married to them. If the answer is "no." Then don't get married to them.
SIMPLES!
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It's hard to take people serious anymore. Surely the article must have been written out of humor. Any man and even boys would know better than that.
- 311 opinions shared on Marriage & Weddings topic.
From just another article. Sickening how the truth gets twisted every day. Men benefiting from marriage... holy shit! We live in an insane, fucked, upside down world.
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Marriage benefits both equally, but divorce benefits women and harms men. That's why half of marriages end in divorce, women file 80% of them and the suicide rate among middle aged men has skyrocketed.
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Considering there is no requirement for women to do anything in marriage, and everything is negotiable for them, while at the same time, men have very clear requirements it definitely benefits women more.
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I never saw any benefits in my marriage. Work, come home to a dirty house and fat slob, listen to nagging and complaining all evening, go to bed, get up and do it all over again. What a life.
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Women might benefit more from the divorce. The marriage itself, if a good one, I can see how the man might benefit more.
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Statistically spoken married women life longer than solo women. So it seems to be good for them to be married.
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Jeff bezos' wife became the richest woman by divorcing him...
There is no benefit for men, only loss
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What does this benefit even mean when you are comparing who gets a better deal?
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Let me guess, that article was written by a woman.😆😆😆
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Men get more benefit because women have nothing more to be benefited since men had always been disadvantaged.
- 1.1K opinions shared on Marriage & Weddings topic. u
They both benefit big time
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What you read is a bullshit article.
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Men do not benefit from marriage lol
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They have more to lose in the long run.
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I think it’s pretty even though not equal
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