Is marriage becoming too expensive and too mentally draining for the working class? A report by University of Virginia sociologist Sarah Corse and Harvard University sociologist Jennifer Silva concludes that "as the American workforce and the American marriage have destabilized
over the past half-century, marriage has become an increasingly
inaccessible option for working-class Americans," Amanda Hess reports for Slate. While the working class struggles, middle-class people "are throwing money at their intimate relationships to keep them stable" and the working class "have been priced out of the institution."
While the recession has hit Americans hard, it is having a drastic affect on marriages, Hess writes. "Thanks to falling working-class wages, the outsourcing of American
manufacturing, the thinning of company benefits, and the rise of
part-time and self-employment, American jobs are, in many ways, less
stable than ever," Hess writes. "Unskilled workers without a higher education are
finding it more difficult to translate blue-collar work into
middle-class stability." And the phenomenon could be worse in rural areas, where residents increasingly spend money and time commuting to jobs elsewhere.
"Many of the working-class Americans interviewed
by Silva and Corse are now too concerned with maintaining their 'own
survival' to 'imagine being able to provide materially and emotionally
for others'," Hess writes, adding that happiness all boils to down to money, and whether or not individuals have the means for vacations, date nights, therapy, college, gyms and fun items. "As traditional work and family structures crumble in the United States,
middle-class Americans have the money to build relationships, yet remain
satisfied as individuals," he concludes. "For working-class Americans, personal
stability sometimes requires staying single and avoiding the risk of
abuse, abandonment, and even more economic and emotional disruption." (Read more)
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