TRANSCRIPT
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The Rabbi Daniel Lapin Podcast
Episode: Shacking Up is for Financial Fools
Date: 11/1/22 Length: 1:02:18
Daniel Lapin 0:00
Greetings, happy warriors, and welcome to the Rabbi Daniel Lapin show where your Rabbi, that would be me reveals how the world rrrrrrrreally works. And today we're gonna look at one of the very interesting ways in which the world really works. And it's so interesting that it baffles, even as august a body as The Wall Street Journal, The Wall Street Journal ran the story on November, the eighth 2022. And since then about 100 other journals around the world have picked up the story and reprinted it. And the headline is as follows. "Moving in together, does not match the financial benefits of marriage. But why?" Yes, that's right, the last part, but why is in the headline, that's what it actually says, moving in together does not matched the financial benefits of marriage. But why completely baffled about this.
Daniel Lapin 1:21
Now in general, by the time something makes it to the popular press, it's already been in the, in the specialist literature for years and years. And sure enough, it wasn't hard for me to go back and discover stuff. A big story appeared in the Federalist in 2017, November 2017. And in in various other scholarly journals, going all the way back to about 2000. As far back as I went, there was no shortage of such journals. But what what is the stories, it's very simple. They cannot understand why if a man and a woman decide to live together, they do not have the same financial outcomes that seem to accrue to a man and woman marry and start a family. It seems to be quite different. So much so that you would have thought, because I mean, after all right, marriage is just a piece of paper, right? And how on earth does a bank balance or a salary check? Or your financial institutions records? How do they know whether you and your spouse have signed a piece of paper or whether you've just moved in together? It shouldn't matter. But it does. So much so that I would have expected that they would classify the economic conditions of two classes of people married and living together, versus divorced and single, or divorced or never married? I that's how I would have divided up with two groups in each categorization, married and living together, because how could it possibly be different and divorced and single, because you can see why those would be very, very similar. It's not like that. If you actually look at the data, it's perfectly clear that financial outcomes fall into two categories: married; and then on the other side, three groups, divorced, single and living together. And so living together is much more like being divorced or single in terms of economic financial outcome than it is like marriage. You get the problem. Right. And a problem it certainly is. I will share with you just a couple of comments from the piece. Wall Street Journal says married couples have four times as wealthy as unmarried couples who live together and they cry and they say, Well, you know, maybe it has to do with the fact that people who are financially better off tend to get married. And they themselves delve into the data and dispute that and ultimately refute that now, apparently, of not that money causes marriage. It's marriage causes money, which is a very, very disturbing outcome for them. It's really not what they wanted to see from the Federalist five years ago.
Daniel Lapin 4:35
A couple of interesting things. The research proves the number one social justice imperative is marriage. In other words, if social justice that everyone speaks about includes financial fairness, quote, then you should really be concerned about marriage. That's what they're saying. Listen to this Charles Murray of the American Enterprise Institute explains, in his important book coming apart the state of white America, that in 1960, the poorly and moderately educated, were only 10% less likely to be married than the college educated, okay? What he's talking about here is that, in this period between World War Two and about 1960, the most reliable indicator of whether or not you had money or you were poor, was whether you had a job, it was as simple as that you had a job away, you had no problem from about 1962, till about 1990. And interesting thing takes over. And now, during that period, it's not just whether you had a job, it's your educational level started playing a much more important role. And so, if you finished high school, and you even had a few years of college, well, that impacted your financial condition, much more than anything else did. And here's what Charles Murray is saying is saying that, in this period, there was very little difference in the marriage rates between people who are well off and people who are not well off. In other words, pretty much everyone in the United States. And yes, don't for a moment think if you're listening in one of the dozens and dozens of countries around the world, where we have wonderful listeners, and where we have happy warriors, people who actually are signed up on our website, and are part of the happy warriors community around the world. I have you in mind as well, because trends hit America, just few years before they hit everywhere else. And so I don't doubt for a moment that much of what I'm discussing, you will be able to see happening in whatever country you live in, as well not to worry about that. And so, it used to be going back to the World War Two to 1960 period, almost no difference in levels of marriage, everybody was married. And if you had a job, you did just fine, came 1962 and on to 1990, approximately. And now there is two things that are happening.
Daniel Lapin 7:21
Number one, the prime determinant as to whether you are financially well off now becomes education. And number two, a growing gap, a huge growing gap between people who are well off and who are married, and people who are not well off who are generally not married. In other words, marriage became a class thing. People in the upper class lots of money or married people with little money or no money, not married. So marriage now changes often 1960 and becomes a very much of a determinant as to where you are in the financial scale of things, says Charles Murray, back over here, in this early period 80 to 90% of the population married and the debt and the difference between wealthy and poor, very low, pretty much everybody's married, then it starts changing dramatically. And during this period, we find a 30 to 40% difference between the financially well off married group and the financially pull off poor of unmarried group. So now, poor people are married at a much lower rate. So only about 50 or 60% of poor people are married. About 90% of rich people are married. Okay, this this is this gets very interesting. Professor Bill Galston. He was President Clinton's adviser on domestic policy during the Clinton administration from 1992 to 2000. And he's now a senior fellow at Brookings. He says in the early 1990s, Americans only had to do three things to avoid living in poverty, graduate from high school, get married, and not have children illegitimately not have children before you married. That's all you had to do, kind of kind of an interesting thing. And Bill Goldston, not a conservative by any stretch of the imagination by the way.
Daniel Lapin 9:41
Marriage boosts every measure of human wellbeing. Consistent and irrefutable mountain of research has shown reaching back to the 1970s that marriage strongly boosts every important measure of wellbeing for children, women and men. Pick any measure you can imagine, overall physical and mental health, income savings, employment, educational success, general life, contentment and happiness, sexual satisfaction, even recovery from disease. All of this married people rate markedly and consistently better in all of these, and many, many more measures as well compared to their single, divorced or cohabiting. peers. Cohabiting means living together obviously, this is the amazing thing, that single divorced and cohabiting are all participants in the lower rungs of of economic and other areas of success. All of this is regardless of race or status of any kind. This is why it's not merely one parent versus two parent families that makes the difference. The US Census Bureau finds the poverty rate for children living with two unmarried cohabiting parents is similar to that of single mother homes. Wow. Married people regardless of how much they have tend to manage their money differently from divorced, single and living together couples. Amazing stuff. But again, none of this literature that I'm reading from gives an explanation. Some of them try various theories, and then usually end up debunking those theories themselves saying no, but you know what this doesn't seem to fit the data doesn't seem to explain it. Marriage is good for people of every race. The advantages of growing up in an intact family and being married extend across the population, they apply as much to blacks and Hispanics as they do to whites. For instance, black men enjoy a marriage premium of at least 12 and a half $1,000 a year in their individual income compared to their single peers, and so on and so forth. He says, and they say, Look, we, you know, trying to trying to find explanations, we can arrive at no alternative explanation, but that marriage itself is a wealth generating institution. So, marriage is far more than just a personal sentimental institution, giving folks something to feel good about and each year's anniversary, it produces profoundly practical and essential value. The scholars at the National marriage project working from the University of Virginia, this is not because the well to do are more likely to marry. But that marriage itself is a wealth generating institution says wild what's going on here. If you really care about inequality, you have to support marriage, the evidence is impossible to ignore or explain away. Even the New York Times no friend of traditional marriage, noted its importance in a major story a few years ago entitled to classes divided by I do the I do of the marriage vows and marriage drives wellbeing and upward mobility. The absence of marriage diminishes it. Thus the growing class divide. Do you want to find any poor demographic and by the way, Richard Theodore Dalrymple, a wonderful writer, writes about these things in the United Kingdom and reports exactly the same thing. Explore the lower economic demographics go and find the part of town or the part of the city or the part anyway, go find where people are very poor, you're going to find that marriage does not exist. Absence of marriage causes poverty. The presence of marriage causes wealth. Listen to what this says. Today, and many unfortunately believe that to be concerned about what kinds of families adults create and raise children should be no one's business. It's a personnel matter. Such people have no idea what a family is, or does anthropologically, each family is as much a public institution as it is private. You hear that? If not more, so. Its strengths and weaknesses have felt through out each community in countless ways. Here's the kicker, government expands as marriage declines. government expands as marriage declines. In other words, people who are married need far less of government services.
Daniel Lapin 15:20
This stuff is pretty amazing. And I'll wrap this up, and then we'll get into the big, big question that nobody tackles, which is how why, how does this work? Let's see. Anything else I wanted to put to you? I don't think so that's, that's basically, that's basically it's pretty amazing stuff. So what is going on here? And how does this really work? I have to start off by telling you about three individuals who played a role in shaping the thinking of the 20th, the 20th century. But they all pretty much lived and did most of their work before the year 19 101 of them was Charles Darwin. And Charles Darwin died in 1882. The next was Karl Marx, who died in 1883. And then was Sigmund Freud. He lived until 1939, I think, but Sigmund Freud was 25 years old when Charles Darwin died. And so a lot of Freud's thinking belong to that period, Darwin, Freud, Marx, what's this got to do with the discussion on marriage? Because there are two ways of looking at reality, and almost every human behavior can be explained, according to both these two ways. The two ways are a god centric way, which means that the first few chapters of the book of Genesis are defining and I'll correct and, and I cover this in detail. In a program you will find on our website, may I say, an incredible program, powerful, persuasive and compelling. It's called scrolling through Scripture. And it's many hours online course in which I take you through those critical, early verses of the book of Genesis. That vision says that human beings were created by a good and loving God in His image. And there's another viewpoint the other viewpoint says that primitive protoplasm became plumbers and proctologist through a lengthy process of an aided materialistic evolution.
Daniel Lapin 17:59
Chimpanzee chimpanzees turned into people, they are the these are the two views. And neither one can be proved, which is fine with me. Because in my world, I have room for faith. But in the world of secular fundamentalism, it's infuriating that they can't prove it. It's infuriating to them, that the whole world doesn't automatically accept their viewpoints. But the important thing to remember is that you can look at any human behavior you like. And you can explain it both ways. altruism, right, altruism? Well, according to the viewpoint of secular fundamentalism, altruism evolved as behavior where people are good to other people, in order to make sure that the species survives. In my view, altruism is part of human goodness, you don't find in all human beings, some human beings are cowardly and selfish and bad. And they don't practice altruism, others do. And so, you know, you can explain it both ways. Men prefer and want sexual exclusivity over their women. A man is not willing to share his woman. I'm saying woman rather than wife for the moment, because I wanted to be acceptable to the viewpoint of secular fundamentalism as well. Okay, fine. Well, according to the idea that that lengthy process of unaided materialistic evolution produced chimpanzees out of protoplasm and people out of chimpanzees Well, well, yeah, because if there's not exclusivity, then a male is not certain whether the offspring is his and, and therefore, he'd be investing resources raising the genetic offspring of another male And you know, you can hear right. But that makes sense. I don't think it makes much sense as much sense as a god centric worldview because in the God-centric worldview, and it's that a God created the world in such a way, so as a that a man and a woman are dedicated to one another, and that a man is determined to have his wife be part of his life. And sharing doesn't fit into that model at all. And that it has nothing to do with certainty of offspring in my worldview in the in a god centric worldview. Because even couples in which there's not going to be any children, no offspring, absolutely no question No, no children whatsoever, men still have exactly the same reluctance to acknowledge the existence of alternative men in their woman's life, it's just it's not possible. And so, so it goes, you've got to understand that we're able to view the world through both lenses up until the beginning of the 20th century. For the most part, it was very widespread, that the god-centric view, human beings are created in the image of God. And this was why it spread. And it resulted in the building of a civilization, because one is constantly viewing one's origins as above, and we feel ourselves being pulled towards a higher heavenly level.
Daniel Lapin 21:44
But along came the beginning of the 20th century, and a major change in all of that the major change was that no, we really are here only because of a primitive process of materialistic evolution, and therefore we're nothing but animals, not surprisingly, the beginnings of a decline in civilization. Because if I'm really nothing but a chimpanzee, why should I have to aspire to be a better person than I was yesterday? There's no reason to do that. Well, in terms of the god centric viewpoint, there are three basic central principles. And one is where did we come from? The good Lord created us in His image? Where are we going to end up? We're going to end up in an embrace with God in a some kind of unimaginable period of divine redemption of humanity, the details of which are not disclosed to us, and what are we supposed to be doing in between, we're supposed to be able to try and create God's kingdom on earth, that that's what we're supposed to be trying to do. But these fundamental principles that are a key part of our understanding of a god centric worldview, well, you got to have them on the other parallel worldview as well. And sure enough, we do. And these three gentlemen, I spoke about Darwin, Freud, and Marx, give us the theology of secular fundamentalism. You want to know where we came from? A just turn to St. Charles Darwin. And you'll find out we came about because caterpillars turned into racehorses, and chimpanzees turned into people. And it was just a materialistic process. Didn't need God, there wasn't a god. That was Darwin giving us where we came from, where we ending up well, thanks to Karl Marx, we were going to end up in a utopian worker's paradise, we just have to have the complete revolution. We have to dismantle civilization, we have to rebuild society on the basis of gender and class and race, and everything will be beautiful and wonderful. It's another view of the future quite different from mine. But there has to be such a view for this to work. And then what are we supposed to be doing in the in between time between our arrival and departure, says Freud, essentially, go for sensation. Go for fun, go for whatever feels good. And if you don't, you'll get sick, mentally sick. If you if you don't let yourself just be your natural self, you will start developing repressive mental disorders. And then you're gonna have to come to me said Uncle segment, and I will give you psychotherapy. By the way, all of this. I have to just tell you, you might well catch me one day reading a book called The 19. introductory lectures on psychoanalysis by Freud. It's good stuff. I mean, there's there's really there's really value You and understanding there. So none of these men were Nobodies, I'm don't don't think you hear me denigrating them. These are very substantive people. But what they did is they provided a intellectual foundation to a materialistic worldview. And now I have to tell you for the purposes of today's discussion, which is the Wall Street Journal, and that married couples are much better off than living together couples, but nobody knows why. Well, by the end of today's show, you will know why. But here's the one most important point for now and for today, having to do with Darwin, and Freud and Marx, and that is that what each of the three, all of the three did was to make human beings entirely malleable and changeable. The term Well, that's human nature doesn't exist with these guys, because everything can be changed. Charles Darwin, at its most basic says, you know, look, I mean, if a, if a shock, can turn into a racehorse, then obviously there is there is no limit. Why would it be hard and Darwin didn't say this, but it follows on perfectly naturally. If a shark can turn into a racehorse, and a caterpillar can become a crab, and an ostrich can become a, a marathon runner, why can't a man become a woman or a woman become a man, there is nothing fixed about human beings, everything is malleable, everything can be changed. Important points. Freud, exactly the same thing. That's what psychotherapy is you you need to change No problem. Come lay on the couch, talk to me, said Uncle segment. And we can change everything about you. Sure enough. And today, a large parts of the mental health profession are actually engaged in unbelievably brutal and violent mutilations of young women, condemning them to permanent sterility, in an effort to change women into men. And that's what's going on. But this is a natural legacy of Marx, Freud, and Darwin. And then Marx himself. Of course, as obviously things can be changed. You know, people behave selfishly doesn't matter, we can produce the new human being and a large part of communist art and sculpture all revolved around the new communist man, the man we're going to produce, who is different from everything that's gone before, they all profoundly believe in the ultimate malleability of human beings.
Daniel Lapin 27:53
And I mentioned that because one of the things that's difficult for anybody who's grown up in the current intellectual climate, hard for anybody to understand and to relate to and to be comfortable with, is the idea that there are certain things about us that don't change, there are certain things about us that are fixed. And one of them is that women, most women have a feeling of wanting to have a child much more than men do. And the notion that you can drive this out of a woman, that by sending a woman into the workforce, indoctrinating a woman with propaganda that suggests that somehow, if you go and work in a hospital or in a daycare center, looking after other people's children, that's much more meaningful than looking after your own children. That's what we're telling women. If you go along and work in an office, or in a factory, or anywhere at all, that's more meaningful than being a wife and a mother. And once you've persuaded women of that, right, okay, here's the important thing. You cannot persuade women of that. You can intellectually, but there are certain things about us that don't change. And so the career woman has been indoctrinated to believe that she should put off marriage and put off child birth. And she should focus on her career, as she's very bothered that at the time when she should be focusing on a career, all of a sudden, she's starting to begin to think about freezing her eggs. No guy thinks in those terms, even though biologically he doesn't need to. But this is bothersome and for many, many women. It's a disturbing thought because I thought I can change me i I thought I can make myself much more committed to a career than I used to be women. My grandmother was committed to being a wife and mother but I don't have to be that way, or the woman who is a career woman and on her way to work has dropped her two month old baby off at the daycare center. And the child weeps piteously as she puts the child down or hands it off to the childcare worker and is about to walk away. And her heartbreaks at her child crying for her. And she knows that she's somehow got to overcome that. And that this is ultimately for the good of the child she tells herself. So what I'm asking you to be aware of is that we are very indoctrinated with a nonstop barrage of propaganda to believe that everything about us can be changed. And it isn't always true. Another example, a man will work much harder for himself than he will for the public good. Right? You want to know why Israel, which was founded on the communist Bolshevik kibbutz model, how come there's virtually no kibitzers in Israel anymore? A kibbutz was essentially a commune, where everybody worked for the common good. You know why? Because they were not able to keep up economically. Because when people can work for themselves, they work much more than for the common good. The tax yield curve is another very well known thing, and that is that the actual tax collected drops. At a certain point, as you increase the level of taxation 20% 30% 40% 50% People stop working. Oh, it's for the common good can pay your taxes? It's a social? Well, it's a good thing. Yeah, trouble is I just won't work as hard if I only get to keep 30 cents out of every dollar I make. I'm just not gonna work. That's human nature. Is 100 years of communism or Marxism going to change that? I don't believe the answer is yes, I don't think anything will change that at all. And so the, the idea that women have a certain feeling in them towards babies, I don't think that's changeable. And I think it's a mistake for people to try and make women feel bad for having that feeling. I know that there are certainly men who, who do feel bad. Inside, they feel bad about the fact that their woman has cheated on them. And then very often, their friends and sometimes their psychiatrists, and therapists say to them, you know, that's a primitive part of you. That's the old masculine, possessive part of you. But you are, you and your woman are two independent entities that have created a socio economic connection, which it should in no way be impacted by what she might choose to do on Wednesday night or what you might choose to do on Thursday night. Men do not respond really well, by they listen to it. They've been conditioned to believe that experts, they've been conditioned to believe the studies that reveal and report but in their hearts, they know that that is simply no good.
Daniel Lapin 33:22
And so what are the three main reasons for why married couples do much better financially than single cup then cohabiting couples, couples living together? Single divorced, etc? What What is the secret? Well, there's three parts to it. And I'd like to explain them to you. They're not they're not simple. They're, they're not. You know, it's I don't, I don't blame the Wall Street Journal for not having given these three explanations. I get it, it said it is hard. But anyway, let's start off with with explanation number one explanation number one, is that when two human beings collaborate, the result is not addition. It's more like multiplication, it might even be exponential. What I mean by that is a dice can fall on any one of six sides, right one through six. Now if we take two dices or die, I'm not sure that there's disagreement on that. But anyway, we take two dices and we throw two dices since each one has six possibilities. Wouldn't you say that there are 12 possible ways that two dices can land? But a moment's reflection tells you that there's not 12 plus 36. You don't add the six in the six you multiply the six and the six because the way that can fall is dice. One can be a one dice two can be 12345. Six, that six, that is two can be a two, and dice. Two can be 123456, 6 times 6 = 36. Why I tell you this is because let's imagine that, that you are capable of coming up in a brainstorming session. Let's say we're dealing with a business problem. We're just dealing with a problem in your sports team that you run or coach, whatever it is, let's say you can come up with, shall we say, two good ideas and our and let's say, I can come up with two good ideas. Now, let's say we each come up with six good ideas. Now that's a better number, that if you put us in a room, we'll each come up with six good ideas now put us in a room together? Will we end up with 12? Good ideas? No, we'll end up with many more than 12. How many more? I don't know. 36, 54, 100? I don't know. But I do know that you two human beings working together produce far more than just the addition of the values of those two human beings. How much more depends on the level of connection between the two people. And so the miracle of exponential arithmetic works much better. With two people who are close, for instance, two strangers come in to brainstorm a business problem, it won't be nearly as good as if two partners who know each other and like each other and respect one another. Now, let those two people get together to brainstorm a problem. And the productivity will skyrocket. They'll be meteoric. And they you can see a big difference you see, when a married couple collaborates and communicates and, and works together and cooperates, the level of arithmetic. Exponential realism goes up dramatically. I'll tell you why. Because it is true people that well, you know, living together, why shouldn't we marriage is just a piece of paper. But here's the thing, the real message of living together. And it's very often tacit, it's often unspoken, but the real message that anybody in a living together relationship recognizes is that right now you will do that I don't know about tomorrow. That's what living together means. And I want to tell you something as well. I'm going to repeat this later in the show as well. The biggest threat to
Daniel Lapin 37:41
social welfare, and to wealth creation, and to stable living and to civilization is impermanent, intimate relationships, impermanent, intimate relationships are far more damaging than you can possibly imagine. And so in a living together arrangement, the amount of cooperation and the amount of collaboration, what beats what this man and woman are living together produce, including economically, will never be what a married couple, simply because of the miracle of exponential arithmetic. There's a big difference between a couple who view their relationship as permanent come what may? It's a very big difference. You know, it's quite well known that tenure in employment situations produces less productivity. In other words, university professors among the least productive people in society, the amount of actual teaching, professors negotiate contracts today, where they have lifetime employment and have to deliver very, very little people who work for government Union's postal employees. Who do you think's more productive, a FedEx employee, or a postal employee? Was nothing against anybody working for the post office? Hey, it's a great gig. If you can get it. I'm not sure I'd turn it down if somebody offered it to me. But bottom line is the FedEx employee can be fired if he doesn't perform. The postal employee can never be fired. Guess who is more productive? You would think, therefore, that if you're a man, and you've just proposed marriage to a woman, you would like to say to her, Hey, listen, we're going to be together as long as you are productive, but there's no tenure here. And you'd think to yourself, it makes sense we're going to live together for as long as it makes sense to me. Now, you're entitled to make the same calculus. But there's no permanence to this and so you'd better be on your toes all the time, which is exactly what a free market, consensual business relationship looks like. Hey, you're hired. This is an at will hiring state I'd love you to come work for me. And as long as it makes sense, as long as you produce more than I pay you, you'll stay you'll have a job here. When you stop, you weren't simple enough, we don't actually even have to state it. It's so obvious and so natural. You might think it makes perfect sense to do this in marriage as well, hey, you know what? Let's not sign any contracts and pieces of paper, implying permanence, no, we're going to be in this as long as it makes sense to us. So we both better be on our toes, look after ourselves, and make sure you're productive. Because otherwise this isn't gonna last, you'd think it would be better than any other form of male female relationship. But it doesn't work that way. It's true for employees, it's true for university professors. But when men and women connect, permanence is a huge advantage. It's It's strange, isn't it? And I need another show to explain why that is the case. But what is absolutely clear to everybody is that yes, it is the case.
Daniel Lapin 41:05
And so the permanence produces far more than a temporary relationship would. And you kind of understand why I mean, just on his most basic level, right? If I'm going to hold back a little bit, because if, if in two years time, we're going to be apart, we're no longer going to be together, well, then I just got to make sure I'm going to be okay in two years time. So I'm not going to put 100% into the US because the US isn't necessarily there for so long. And so with both parties, subconsciously, perhaps holding back a little bit pulling back just a little bit. Obviously, the economic productivity of the Union isn't nearly where it would be when the presumption is of permanence. And that is the key to marriage, the presumption of permanence, divorce seldom shouldn't happen often when it does, it's tragic. But by and large, we start off with a presumption that this is forever, everybody knows. So that's explanation number one for why it is that married couples outperform couples who live together economically. A reason number two. Reason number two is because man, wealth and money making is multi generational, this is hugely important to understand. Please know that the snapshot never creates or provides you with an accurate picture of an economic or financial reality compared to a video. And that's why the whole idea of building public policy and welfare policy on the basis of a snapshot fails dismally in America in the sense that it's a snapshot of everybody's income. How much money did you make last year? Well, if it's below $30,000, you're on the poverty level, and we have to give you food stamps. But wait a sec, the only reason you own you made only 30,000 is that you are a law student, and you are working very, very part time. And next year, you're going to be working at a high salary for a prestigious law firm. And five years after that you're going to be a partner, you got to realize that all of us are on a video, we're not under snapshots. And so when it comes to wealth creation, it's always multigenerational. It is the fact that my parents might give us a gift when we get married, her parents might give us a gift, help start us off. Maybe there's family business that lets us have a good job to start off with. Don't for one moment think that when a man and a woman marry in real life, they are this independent unit in a snapshot, it doesn't work back there. They are part of a video, there is a long process that's going on of which they are apart. And in the same way that down the road, they will do things for their children.
Daniel Lapin 44:20
So please understand that the idea that every child born into the United States of America today is going to be equivalent to every other child born into there. You can't say that, because a child that is born to a single mother, who has six other children by six other men, that child know regardless of whatever the government does do or doesn't do, there's no way that that child can ever have the equivalent life of a child born into a loving marriage. A father and a mother dedicated to one another and to the His child, and they're dedicated to the child's education. And they're going to give the child a great start off in life. And later, when the child gets big and gets married him or herself, the parents are in a position to help them. Wealth is multi generational. Now why should that impact couples who live together very simply, this? Families and this is again, a well known phenomenon. Think about it. I mean, you either know situations like it, or if you don't, if you just do it as a thought experiment in your own life, you realize that what I'm saying is very true. And that is that there is an emotional hold back from families, when a couple of together, let's say your brother checks up with his girlfriend. Well, it's not the first time he's done it. And so there's an emotional hold back. You don't feel all in? Or how about do you really think that that your mother will give her mother's ring to you, you shacking up with your girlfriend, and you know, your mom has a family heirloom, your grandmother's wedding ring? Do you think she's gonna give it to you? Why would she? Because two years down the road, you're going to be broken up with this girl and living with another girl. And meanwhile, there'll be a fight about grandma's ring? Do we get it back? Or does the girl say, Hey, you gave it to me? No, we don't do that. There's a whole back. And in the same way that parents do not be so sentimental gifts on a young couple that is living together. They don't be stolen material and larger gifts either. Because you just there's no permanence in permanent, intimate relationships, unbelievably destructive.
Daniel Lapin 46:46
And so, yes, it's possible. And in normal families, this happens. All right, a son in the family picks a wife, and they get married. And for a wedding gift, the parents give the young couple, either a sum of money, or maybe they make the wedding or maybe they have a small vacation cottage that's been part of the family for two or three generations, because wealth creation is multi generational. None of these things happen. If you shack up with your girlfriend, why should your parents give you anything? Why it makes no sense. And so that's reason number two. And again, the popular culture, they would love to believe that every situation is the same. And as I read to you from the from a study, people would like to believe that marriage is totally private of all living arrangements of equal value not true. A society has to be crazy, not to encourage marriage and discourage living together. But at any rate, in terms of what baffled the finance, the Wall Street Journal, oh, how could this be? How is it possible that couples who live together do not have the wealth of couples who marry? Well, I've just given you two reasons.
Daniel Lapin 48:14
And now I'm going to give you the third and final reason. And the third and final reason has to do with a sexual relationship. What do I mean by that? You remember I said that, something that isn't going to change not this year, not next year, not next generation, not going to change about human beings the way the good Lord created us. Certain things don't change, and exclusivity over your woman is one of the things that really matters to you. Now, here's the important thing. I spoke about multigenerational them. And now I want to explain the idea that the time scale on this graph can stretch and contracted can expand as well as contract.
Daniel Lapin 49:06
What am I talking about? Well, it's like this. Alright. It's perfectly obvious. Everybody understands. Nobody want no man wants to be with a woman who cheats on him. But how's about being with a woman who is going to cheat on you? Hasn't happened yet, but it's going to happen in the future. That shouldn't bother you. It hasn't happened yet. Come on, what sort of man are you? Are you a madman or your primitive relic? I'm a primitive relic. Because even if I know that in five years time, my woman is going to cheat on me. That spoils the relationship right now. Now you might want to how can you know you can never know this is a thought experiment. Let's stipulate that you now it shouldn't matter to you because it hasn't happened yet. it, but it does you see, because relationships are on a timescale that that is based on a video, not a snapshot. So at this moment, the snapshot is, hey, she hasn't cheated on me. She's loyal to me right now. No problem. But that's not how it works. Real life is built with a video. Not a snapshot. That's how life works. And on a video, we haven't gotten to the part of the video yet where she's going to cheat on you. But when she does, you will know about it. But wait, now I know she's going to that already spoils everything.
Daniel Lapin 50:42
This is so deeply implanted, that I'm even going to take a lesson from popular culture. Now you'll laugh at me because I had to research this a little bit. And I discovered that the mean is so widespread that there were millions of hits on Google. What I searched for was bro code. That's right, B, R O C O D, E, bro code. They like the brothers code, the brethren code, the buddies code, it's all the same thing. What is the buddy's got what you believe this is the weirdest thing, right? If you think about this, not in terms of what you know, in the culture, because you may know much more about this than I do. But to me, intellectually, it's shocking to discover that you may not date the ex of your buddy. That's right. Your buddy breaks up with his girlfriend. Don't you dare start dating her. what point does that matter? Well, I'm telling you, your buddy's gonna be mad at you. Why should he he's broken up with her? Well, he just does. Because retroactively remember the expanding timescale? It's not just a snapshot, it's a video, and what is going to happen in the future wrecks what happens now? And what has happened in the past, wrecks the present? That's right, it's, you got to think in a spiritual timeframe. And you see, this makes perfect sense. And I think about there's a barbaric custom that used to be practiced in parts of India, until the British came along and colonized India and brought civilization to India, which to this day still pays off in the way India is becoming very much an important country on the planet. Honest to goodness. You know, the United Nations Security Council has five permanent members, one of them is France. It makes as much sense, you know, in 1815, there was something called the Congress of Vienna. And that was when the five powerful nations of Europe got together, post Napoleon, to figure out what the world order was going to look like that it was Austria and Russia and Prussia and England and France. And today, it would make no sense would it to sort of try and order the world on decisions made at the Congress of Vienna in 1815? Well, it makes about as much sense to order the world on the United Nations that was formed in the aftermath of World War Two Security Council, five permanent members, one of which is France. Come on, who's more important in the world today from So India? Right? It's not even a question. And yet here, we are still stuck on that old. You know, the United Nations model is nothing but destructive. No good comes out of the United Nations at all. And this is just one of the reasons anyway, back to India, there was a barbaric practice called su T. And what su T was, was that a widow was immolated on the funeral pyre of her dead husband. What's that all about? Exactly what we're talking about. The man wanted to know now call it primitive call and barbaric. I'll join you all of those things. But what we're talking about is a fundamental human instinct that is built in to men of every race, color, creed, nationality, and everything else. And that is they want loyalty, and exclusive exclusivity of a woman, not only today, but even on an expanded timeframe you follow, think about what I'm trying to get across. I'll be the first to admit that this is very, very, very difficult to grasp. But if you want to understand like what was in the minds of early Indians who came up with this idea of Su T, whilst the barbarism of it is unquestioned, the concept that underlay it was this very concept, and that is that my life is better? If I know my wife will never sleep with another man. Never never going to happen, not while we're married, and not after I'm dead. Got it. That's what certainty was all about. That's all. Now, in today's a day and age, I think, you know, most couples are trying to be civilized about them. So they speak in terms of, you know, if anything should happen to me, of course, I want you to remarry, etc, etc. And, and that happens, and it's often a very beautiful thing. But I'm talking about a much more basic, masculine human instinct that goes on here. And it's really, really important to understand. Another area is going backwards, not forwards, right? I mean, speaking about going forwards that, that your life as a man today is diminished. If you know your wife will be with another man in two years time it's diminished. And it works going backwards as well, in the final analysis, there's something else in the popular culture. Who would have thought that your rabbi even knows about this, but it's something called a body count. A body count is essentially how many men a woman has been with. And the fact is, it bothers guys. Now, women, you know, don't let anybody tell you men don't care. They really, really, really do not just mean men in general care. And they rationalize they come up with things. Well, you know, I can't expect to be a virgin because I'm not obviously in so I can't expect it. But what happens if you discover that she has a body count of 45? And I talked to men all the time, it's out of them, I would never marry a woman. And how about two? Well, yeah, I could probably live with two. How about 11? Well, I'm not sure I added a competent number. And men are sometimes tormented. When they start dating a woman, they want to -- I don't want to be rude and, but I do want to know what happens. I want to know how many other men issue with, but it's not it's pastors before she ever knew you. It doesn't matter. It's none of your business? Yes, it is. That's the important thing to understand. The time scale expands. It's not a snapshot, it's a video.
Daniel Lapin 57:25
And now you should be able to understand the fundamental difference between sexual relationships in marriage and sexual relationships in living together. A sexual relationship in living together, - not only and I'm not even now going into the past, not even Well, if she's living with maybe she lived with somebody else before me, maybe she'll have three other people before me. Know, we're talking about living together implies and impermanence. That's exactly you know, the words just a piece of paper or, you know, it's it's like the title to your real estate is just a piece of paper, a pretty important piece of paper. It's a contractual relationship that implies permits. And permanence means that our sexual relationship is completely exclusive now and forever. Again, you know, she becomes a widow, she'll remarry, whatever. But in normal terms, I'm thinking forever. If I am living with her, the normal idea is, hey, the whole nature of this is impermanent. That's what living there that actually means. And the statistics bear this out, by the way, everybody knows this. Couples that live together before they marry should have better marriage statistics they have worse, many, many, many more couples who live together, get divorced, then couples wait till they're married to live together. It's it's just a reality.
Daniel Lapin 58:49
All of which tied to this fundamental idea, what's this got to do with money? What it's got to do with money is that the way the good Lord created the sexual relationship between a husband and wife is that that relationship fills each one with a profound sense of gratitude to the other. So much so that a deep source of almost sensual pleasure to each partner is how much ecstasy and joy he or she was able to bring to the other. So not at all, a selfish process is not at all. It's very, very much related to the idea of, I really want to bring you joy, and the other parties that I really want to bring you and your joy adds to my own. The system that the good Lord created is not animalistic at all. It's not self centered. It's very much other centered. And the result is a feeling that suffuses the entire being of a success. For a marriage of gratitude towards one another, and when you are filled with gratitude towards one another, you can't do enough for the other person. And so when we read in the literature on the subject, and all the data confirms this, that men who are married, are filled with a deep desire to be productive, and to be loyal and to be there and to do things. It's very different from living together. That's what we're talking about.
Daniel Lapin 1:00:31
And so there we have the three basic reasons that the Wall Street Journal didn't have when they asked, how can it be that married couples outperform financially, couples who live together? Why? That's why because of these realities, that make sense, and I'll fully understandable, once you get used to the idea that we live not just in a physical world, but a spiritual world. And once you realize that the world as viewed through the eyes of Darwin, and Freud, and Marx is one way of looking at things. But there's another way of looking at things, which is not only as persuasive, but it's actually even more compelling. It explains more about human behavior than does a secular materialistic worldview. So my dear happy warriors. The website is, as always, Rabbi Daniel lapin.com, you need to go take a look at Scrolling through Scripture, which is the online resource at the website in order to get a deeper understanding of everything we're discussing today. And I wish you a wonderful week until we're next together, and when you can enjoy a week of climbing upwards and onwards in your five F's, your families, your finances, your friendships, your faith, and your physical fitness. Until next week, I'm Rabbi Daniel Lapin. God bless.
