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Full-Text Articles in Law
Incentivizing Divorce, Andrea B. Carroll
Incentivizing Divorce, Andrea B. Carroll
Journal Articles
Marriage is an important relationship, both for the parties to it and for society as a whole. Its benefits, stemming from the economies of scale and joint consumption inherent in the relationship, are largely unquestionable. And when marriage fails, the results are rather staggering. Economically, it is estimated that the annual cost of divorce to American taxpayers approaches $30 billion. From a social science perspective, the negative impacts of divorce on women and children have long been decried. In the face of these facts, we expect family law to fulfill a certain role. It should channel parties into the relationship …
The One-Size-Fits-All Family, Margaret F. Brinig, Steven L. Nock
The One-Size-Fits-All Family, Margaret F. Brinig, Steven L. Nock
Journal Articles
Family policy and the law based on it assume universals. That is, if marriage improves the welfare of the majority of couples and their children, it is worth pushing as a policy initiative. Further, laws will be written (or kept on the books) that privilege marriage over other family forms. Similarly, research that tells us that divorce harms children except following the relatively small number of highly conflicted marriages, spawns efforts to preserve troubled marriages or even to roll back liberal or relatively inexpensive divorce laws. With yet another example, since adopted children mostly do better than children left either …