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Half the men in Seattle are never-married singles, census data shows

(www.seattletimes.com)
118 points blondie9x | 1 comments | 13 Apr 25 14:36 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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jandrewrogers ◴[13 Apr 25 15:15 UTC] No.43673380[source]▶
Anecdotally, among the people I know in Seattle, many people who have happily been in the same relationship for decades are not married. People are not avoiding long-term relationships, they are avoiding the baggage and fairly rigid assumptions that comes with state intervention in their relationships. There is zero social pressure to be “officially” married so people have no reason to do it for the sake of social conformity. Both men and women are subscribing to this.

I think some of this is a side-effect of many people planning to never have children.

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willidiots ◴[13 Apr 25 15:41 UTC] No.43673584[source]▶
One thing to be mindful of is that this limits your ability to help your partner as you age. State intervention can play both ways.
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jb1991 ◴[13 Apr 25 15:43 UTC] No.43673605[source]▶
That’s unfortunate. And it’s a uniquely American mindset. Long-term relationships in Europe for example do not require marriage in the same way that Americans do. People get married in the states because of the law, people get married in other countries because they just want to get married for emotional or spiritual reasons.
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1. graemep ◴[13 Apr 25 16:46 UTC] No.43674079{3}[source]▶
As I said in another comment this leads to many people being disadvantaged.

I do not know where you live, and these laws vary between countries, but in the UK marriage gives you a lot of important legal rights. Not marring disadvantages a lower earning partner (most often a woman who has taken time off a career to look after kids) if the relationship breaks down, it does not give you the same legal rights if one dies with regard to inheritance (no real rights if there is no will, far less right to contest a will, and the loss of a significant inheritance tax exemption even if there is), or being automatically next of kin (I think this has improved in practice), no automatic joint parental responsibility for children, etc.