Ok I realize I said I was out of this conversation but bc I have friends still here I been watching it. Too many of you are saying the government et al do not want to stop marriage. My whole point in my original comment is that they are doing what they can to make marriage inconvenient and thus unwanted by many people. A lot of people look for the easy way of doing things. The easy way to get money. The easy way to get a job. The easy was to get insurance. The easy way to get assistance. Etc. The truth of the matter is in the days when I was growing up, if a couple was married they were more likely to get the house for sale than the couple applying for it who are living together, and the married couple with children was more likely to get assistance than the single mother with children. The married man would land the job quicker than the single man. The married couples got tax breaks. There were all sorts of "pluses" to being married. Now, not only has all that changed but laws are being made to make it more difficult financially on the married couple vs those who choose to live together.

Yes, some of the changes are good... but making it difficult to be married is not. And seeing so many of you say the government wants people to marry so they can benefit from it, is even worse in some ways. The truth of the matter is, the government doesn't care about the companies that make their living off weddings (wedding chapels, bridal gown stores, etc), nor do they care about our individual bank account, it is more profitable to them for us to be in debt honestly. All the government cares about is keeping things controlled and maintained in whatever way they choose at that particular moment in time. Churches make profit with or without weddings simply off the offerings, donations, events, and outreach they do. As far as magistrates, heck they get paid no matter if there is a marriage or not, they do other things too - as do judges. Hotels and etc make most their money from tourism, not Honeymooners. Same with airlines or buses or trains. Nobody is out planning a whole big scam to get people married. They are in fact doing the opposite these days. Making the laws on who is elgible for marriage simpler, the laws after getting married tougher, and the laws for getting divorced extremely difficult. By doing that, they know people are going to be less likely to want to marry, because it amounts to the "roach motel" for humans. "You can check in - but you don't check out"

It costs more to divorce than to marry and if your finances are already stretching you thin during your marriage because of the laws... that's difficult. What makes it even more difficult? Most places require a couple to be separated for 6months or longer before a divorce can be granted. And, if your spouse refuses to sign the paperwork? Then you have to pay another bill to advertise for an amount of time plus foot the entire divorce cost. So no, the government is not enticing people into marriage by making everything except saying "I do" harder, they are pushing people away from it. Please stop saying otherwise.