The institution of the family has never been weaker. And by punishing marriage, President Joe Biden’s $3.5 trillion spending agenda will only weaken it further.
Marriage used to be the foundational building block of society. In 1960, 75% of all households included a married couple, and 44% included a married couple with children. Today, just 49% of all households include a married couple, and just 19% contain a married couple with children.
Many Democrats treat marriage as a tool of patriarchal oppression, but decades of research show that it is highly beneficial not only for children but also for adults.
Even after controlling for race and income, children born to married parents reach adulthood healthy, wealthy, and gainfully employed at higher rates than those born to unmarried parents. Married adults are themselves healthier, wealthier, and happier than their unmarried counterparts. No institution has a better track record than marriage of fostering successful life outcomes.
For 60 years, the Left has responded to this, as night follows day, by trying to supplant families with social engineering programs. Virtually every means-tested program — Medicaid, food stamps, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, public housing, and Obamacare, to name just a few — punishes people by stanching the flow of benefits to those who get married.
By expanding these programs, Biden’s $3.5 trillion spending agenda makes these marriage penalties worse. According to a new paper by the Niskanen Center, Biden’s Earned Income Tax Credit expansion would by itself cause couples to lose $2,500 per year if they tie the knot.
Some couples would suffer more than others. Couples without children in which one partner makes significantly more than the other would suffer the smallest penalties. Couples in which a single mother earns about the same as her partner would suffer the most.
Biden’s Medicaid and Affordable Care Act expansions also punish marriage. Working families know these marriage penalties exist and don’t think they are fair. A black working mother in Atlanta recently told a focus group about another mother who had chosen not to get married so she could keep her federal benefits: “I just feel like they should do something when it comes to married couples, because it’s sad that she has to choose between marrying a man she loves or losing the benefits that she has. That shouldn’t be a choice that any working American or any American should have to make.”
No one should have to choose between social benefits and marriage. But that is exactly the choice the Left has been forcing on generations of people. Biden now intends to make the problem worse.
