6/3/11: Marriage Good for Families, Economy

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Family Research Council’s Marriage and Religion Research Institute released a paper last week showing that economic well-being in the United States is strongly related to marriage.

The paper, entitled Marriage and Economic Well-Being, shows that married couples are better off economically than persons in any other family structure. The paper reports that only 5.8 percent of married families were living in poverty in 2009.

Pat Fagan of FRC said “Having the security of marriage in which to foster children is vital to reducing reliance on government welfare programs that cost taxpayers at least 112 billion dollars annually.

Fagan said married men tend to have more stable employment histories and make, on average, almost 30 percent more than their non-married counterparts.