Marriage Statistics

[Superfreak]

link removed been given permission to repost the information I had originally posted that countered the argument made in a thread that "20% of men get 80% of the women".

 

 

The stat that 20% of men get 80% of women was taken out of a mens magazine,

 

 

Marriage and Family

 

51%

 

The percentage of women 15 years old and over in

2000 who were married and living with their spouse. Of the rest, 25

percent had never married, 10 percent were divorced, 2 percent were

separated and 10 percent were widowed.

 

link removed

 

 

Since polygamy is illegal in the U.S that means that since 51% of women are married according to the 2000 U.S census, that would also mean that 51% of men are ALSO currently married. You should also note that this only covers the number of women that are CURRENTLY married. We see that when it comes to women that have never been married, its only 25%.

 

Also we can see at this site :

 

link removed

 

that only 30.2% weighted average of the Male population over 15 has never married. This means that the other 70% were able to be in a relationship and get married.

 

Thus, respectable government statistics contradict the idea that 80% of men can never find any woman. In fact its the opposite, only about 30% of men have never married. Thus, it stands to reason that at least 70% of men have *had* a woman (and in fact this is low since the statistic only refers to MARRIAGE), putting an end to this 20/80 idea.

 

[robowarrior]

I don't know what was edited or what not , but i think that even if these stats where reliable they really have no reflection towards your personal life, you have to live and organise your own relationships and be in charge of your life yourself and try to make the best of it if you choose so.

 

Besides who says that relationships are a good thing to begin with?

[Batya33]

What are the percentages of those marriages that are arranged? The percentage that are reasonably stable? Currently living with spouse does not take into account previous separations - percentage of those? How about the percentage of those marriages that are open marriages? Getting married is easy. Staying married and at least stable in the marriage is the true measure and measure of accomplishment.

[Superfreak]

What are the percentages of those marriages that are arranged? The percentage that are reasonably stable? Currently living with spouse does not take into account previous separations - percentage of those? How about the percentage of those marriages that are open marriages? Getting married is easy. Staying married and at least stable in the marriage is the true measure and measure of accomplishment.

 

Thanks for completely ignoring the point of the thread...

 

These statistics were used to refute the idea that 20% of men get 80% of women. Clearly if so many people are getting married in there later year than this is *conclusive* proof that that figure is completely wrong. It doesn't at all matter how many were divorced or arranged (arranged is likely to be almost statistically insignificant btw), because it doesn't change the fact that in each case the man must have been able to get a woman to marry him.

 

There's so many guys that cling to that 20/80 rule on this forum as an excuse that there lack of dating prospects is somehow universal and the system is rigged against them, and this shows that that kind of thinking simply isn't accurate.

[Batya33]

Thanks for your response. I think it does matter about why the marriage happened - just because a man can "get" a woman to marry him is not relevant without context just as I wrote. I don't think the men who complain that 20% of men "get" 80% of women would be concerned if the "getting" included, as it likely does in your statistic, arranged marriages, green card marriages, loveless marriages, marriages of convenence, brief marriages followed by a separation - ie so they are still married, unhappy marriages. It's not the "getting a woman to marry him" that I think is the concern but "getting" a woman to happily marry him and stay happily married.

 

If indeed all a man wanted was to get some woman, any woman, to say "I do" even if the next day they separated (i.e. according to the statistic they would still be legally married), or even if the woman didn't love them, desire them, only wanted their money, only wanted a green card, then yes I would agree with you. I sincerely doubt that that is the context in which those men you speak of complain that there is an imbalance here. A man can basically do a mail order bride if he wants but most men I know don't want that and that is not the issue when they are concerned about not being able to find a relationship.

 

So, yes, I do believe my response was directly on point and demonstrates a potential flaw in your analysis. Have a great day!

[Superfreak]

percent had never married, 10 percent were divorced, 2 percent were separated and 10 percent were widowed.

 

That's taken right off my statistic at the beginning. Divorces/separations are 12% and it's unlikely that all of these were "I do" and then separated the next day.

 

This "flaw in my analysis" ignores two things. For one, the onus is on you to prove that my analysis is so flawed and the 20/80 figure (which doesn't have ANY statistical evidence by the way) is correct.

 

The 20/80 figure is used in regards to dating/getting regular sex from women NOT marriage. I used marriage as a statistical indicator because there is no other way to quantify how many people have had a date because that kind of census is not taken by the government whereas marriage census's are.

 

That being said, although you're right theres statistical outliers of green card marriages and arranged marriages, are you seriously arguing that there is so many arranged and green card marriages that my statistic is significantly skewed by it? If you really believe that it could skew the statistic so much that the no evidence 20% figure is closer than my census backed 70% data (a difference of 50%) than that would mean that theres quite literally tens of millions of people in the United States that have green card and arranged marriages. If there were so many green card marriages in the U.S you bet that there'd be a huge public outcry against all these "illegal aliens", but nope not a peep from the press about it so back up your claims with some data or concede that green card and arranged marriages hardly make a dent anywhere near large enough to serve as proof of the 20% figure.

[Batya33]

I believe that when people have a complaint that others seem to "get" men or "get" women but they do not, they are referring to "getting" a happy/stable relationship not just "getting" a marriage certificate.

 

So, yes, you are right if you interpret the complaint to be that somehow men don't "get" women and "get" means "get a marriage certificate" no matter if the marriage is happy, stable, arranged, green card, marriage of convenience.

 

In my view a response to those men who have that complaint that "well, it's not true because look at the high percentage of marriages so obviously men are "getting" women to marry them - thereforeeee your complaint is unfounded" - does not respond to the real complaint - the real meaning of "get" which is a complaint that men are getting women in the sense of getting a happy/stable relationship or perhaps getting sex (which your marriage statistic does not answer either as you have no idea what percentage of those couples have an active sex life).

 

It's all in how you interpret the complaint - not cut and dried. Since you cannot back up your data with the percentage of those marriages that are happy, stable or complete (as in including a healthy sex life, etc) then according to my interpretation of the initial complaint, your statistics don't respond to the concern. No need for me to concede anything and certainly no worries if you care to disagree.

[Superfreak]

I stil don't think your understanding what the initial complaint was. This was never an argument over marriage it was an argument over dating. Now the only two cases you outlined where there would presumably never have been a man going on a date with a woman is green card and arranged marriages. Aside from this statistically insignificant amount of people, the rest first got a date with a woman, and eventually married her.

 

Whether things turned bad after the marriage or not is irrelevant to the point that 70% of men having been married means that more than 20% of these men went on a date with the woman they intend to marry.

 

Again to reiterate, this stat proves that more than 20% of men get dates, and indeed in the *majority* of cases men are successful enough to get married (even if they marry the wrong person). This by definition disposes of the 20/80 rule. But again no worries on my end if you want to continue defending this 20/80 rule but point to any sort of evidence if you want to hold it as anything other than a simple personal opinion.

[Batya33]

Yes if "getting a date" (and "getting a marriage certificate") is defined as success and relevant to the initial percentage argument, then you are right. Most people I know, if they stop and think about it, know that they can get a date fairly easily - someone will be willing to go on a date with them (she might be his grandmother's age or 14 years old, or be married, engaged, have some physical or mental attribute that would not be at all a match for him) - and someone will be willing to marry them if they are willing to do mail order, or similar.

 

That is not what concerns them. When the complaint is that a small percentage of men get a large percentage of the women, leaving the rest of the men in the dust, it's not a technical argument that can be answered with technical statistics. It's an observation (one that I don't agree with) that out of the dating pool in a given area, a small percentage of the popular guys are getting dates with a large percentage of the desirable women, leaving the less "hot" guys or less "cool" guys dateless. I don't think there is a basis for this complaint either but not because of the statistics you present to disprove it.

 

So simply pointing to marriage statistics and the fact that most likely the bride and groom went on at least one date before getting married doesn't respond in a relevant manner to the real concern here. It technically responds only. Technically it means that a higher percentage of men than 20% went on at least one date with their brides. That you are correct technically I don't think responds to the relevant concern here.

[Superfreak]

OK I think I get you now. I'm sorry for any misunderstanding that took place. You're right that there's no way to conclusively "prove" using solely statistics what happens in the dating world, but I think these stats at the very least disprove those that view the 20/80 rule in terms of only 20% get dates. If others define 20/80 rule some other way such as how you defined it then the statistics are somewhat less applicable.

 

Context is definitely key I suppose. And to put this in a better context, the thread that I initially posted in (that ended up being split by a mod into this thread) had me responding to someone whom took the 20/80 statistic to show that the majority of men never get dates. Which is when I posted these statistics to disprove it. So in that context they were effective, but in the context of who gets the most number of dates in absolute terms I can definitely see how they become less applicable.

[Batya33]

Especially when you know full well that you command a higher percentage of all dates than any living breathing male, yes? ;-)

[Superfreak]

Especially when you know full well that you command a higher percentage of all dates than any living breathing male, yes? ;-)

 

Haha, I don't know if that was a compliment or a shot at my ego

 

But nope, I have a steady g/f and you can count me in to that group of guys that used to think the dating world was rigged against them

[Dating Coach]

You're talking about marriage. I'd wager that most people end up married in their life (in the US). This in no way talks about success in dating and relationships, nor about having a healthy relationship. You're talking about two different things here and calling it the same.

[Leonhart]

I heard that nearly 90% of adults end up married at some point in their lives. That doesn't describe the quality of their marriages, mind you.

[Superfreak]

You're talking about marriage. I'd wager that most people end up married in their life (in the US). This in no way talks about success in dating and relationships, nor about having a healthy relationship. You're talking about two different things here and calling it the same.

 

I was talking about a very specific claim when posting that and didn't intend it to be a reflection of the quality of the relationships in question. I think alot of the confusion is from the fact that this thread got split from another thread in which I used this as evidence against a posters points made in that thread. Unfortunately flame-ing ensued and all posts were deleted for some reason so the OP ended up being split.

 

Basically I'm agreeing with you that these don't represent success in relationships, but I never intended them to be a reflection of this.

[Dating Coach]

Basically I'm agreeing with you that these don't represent success in relationships, but I never intended them to be a reflection of this.

 

Glad you said that, because it was my post that you were trying to dispute and in my post I wasn't talking about marriage statistics, I was talking about dating and success with relationship statistics. thereforeeee we are both in agreement that this thread of yours isn't talking about the post you thought you were refuting.

 

On a side note, I did say that I "heard somewhere" and that the statistics aren't likely accurate. In calling out those statistics you likely have a case, however you would be ignoring the true intent of the post which strikes home with so many men, and I know this not only because I was once one myself but also because these same guys load the forums up with very similar stories. We're all in the same boat and the thread was designed to explain why and what we can try to avoid it.

[Superfreak]

Actually, it wasn't your thread it was another poster whom read the statistic out of a mens magazine. Also it did refute the initial claim that 80% of men don't get involved in any relationships. However since alot of people that have said this either meant or simply change there position to make the question more nuanced such as by saying "80% of men never get any *hot* women" or whichever other variation the poster chooses, I can see how these stats don't apply in a case like that.

 

I do know of your thread and I may have even posted in it, and I agree that giving advice on how to be more successful is never a bad thing (It's what the forum was designed to do afterall

[Dating Coach]

That's odd, because I did throw out a number of 20% of the men out there are having the most success with 80% of the women. I read that somewhere and loosely used it in a post of mine that was on the main page when you posted this. Weird coincidence...

[ghost69]

"Since polygamy is illegal in the U.S that means that since 51% of women are married according to the 2000 U.S census, that would also mean that 51% of men are ALSO currently married. You should also note that this only covers the number of women that are CURRENTLY married. We see that when it comes to women that have never been married, its only 25%. "

 

This would only be true if the guy to girl ratio was 1:1. which it is not.

[Superfreak]

"Since polygamy is illegal in the U.S that means that since 51% of women are married according to the 2000 U.S census, that would also mean that 51% of men are ALSO currently married. You should also note that this only covers the number of women that are CURRENTLY married. We see that when it comes to women that have never been married, its only 25%. "

 

This would only be true if the guy to girl ratio was 1:1. which it is not.

 

That was a bad sentence to have written I'll admit, but the difference is so minimal between the ratio; probably something like 51% women and 49% men as to be insignificant.

 

That being said I elaborate in this quote:

 

We see here that only 30.2% weighted average of the Male population over 15 has never married. This means that the other 70% were able to be in a relationship and get married.

[ghost69]

so guys last longer in marriage than women do.

[Superfreak]

so guys last longer in marriage than women do.

 

Not quite. The 51% statistic represents only the number of women that are currently married. Whereas it also goes on to say that 25% of women have never married. I didn't gather any stats on how many men are *currently* married just how many have been married so the best comparison is this:

 

25% of women have never married, and 30% of men have never married. There's the inequaliy right there, about 5%.

[ghost69]

yes, but do you have a stat for how many women are currently married that have been married before. thus creating a failure statistic to compare.