The Marriage Placebo

Myra Batchelder

October 02, 2006

Myra Batchelder is a Policy Analyst in the Economic Opportunity Program at Demos.

Struggling to pay the bills in Washington, D.C.? Just get married.

Sen. Sam Brownback, R.-Kan., and Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D.-D.C., were out recently drumming up more funding for a new Washington, D.C.-based marriage promotion incentive program for low-income families. It gives low-income couples who choose to get married many advantages, from priority status for low-income and federally-funded housing to "marriage development accounts," which provide a federally-funded match of three to one for their savings. This program is one of many across the country promoting marriage as a solution to poverty.

At the same time, in another part of the country, the legality of marriage promotion programs is coming into question. Americans United for Separation of Church and State recently filed a lawsuit against the Department of Health and Human Services to block taxpayer funding for a Vancouver, Wash., program that offers "Bible-based" marriage education, citing a violation of the necessary separation between church and state. The debate over marriage promotion programs has officially begun in the courts, and I, for one, hope they are required to change.