According to a recent "study," divorce and single parenting costs Americans $112 billion a year.

This "study" has to be among the worst conclusions drawn from a correlation in recent history.

Pointing at impoverished, unwed mothers in urban areas as drains on federal money and claiming that the reason they are in their situation is because they aren't married is also demeaning, offensive, patriarchal, and shows clear evidence of ignorance and privilege shaping the "news" that citizens receive.

So, Institute for American Values (I guess I'm not an American, then), you're suggesting that the reason those women and their children utilize social services and welfare programs is because they don't have husbands?

Surely, husbands - male heads of the family - would bring in ample income and provide healthy social role models for those otherwise bastard children that couldn't be properly raised or supported by their mothers. Why, we might even draw the conclusion that women are lesser people than men - nothing without their husbands or fathers to support them, ignorant of how to raise children and keep them safe.

Could you tell me again, please, where you got this data?

"Scafidi's calculations were based on the assumption that households headed by a single female have relatively high poverty rates, leading to higher spending on welfare, health care, criminal justice and education for those raised in the disadvantaged homes."

So...this data was a result of your "assumption" that all households headed by a single female lead to those unfortunate results?

"While the study doesn't offer formal recommendations, it does suggest that state and federal lawmakers consider investing more money in programs intended to bolster marriages."

Hmm...so, you don't offer a solution that's viable or egalitarian, but you think the U.S. should pour money into the cause?

"Texas last year earmarked about $15 million in federal funds for marriage education."

Whoa. You know, the nonprofit I worked for last year had an annual operating budget of less than $300,000. This year, it won't be offering summer school due to budget cuts in the local public school district. $15 million could sure help that little place out, as well as the school district. Heck, it could fund, like, libraries and stuff. Or be used to better those failing social service programs.

"'Because of the very large taxpayer costs associated with high rates of divorce and unwed childbearing, and the modest price tags associated with most marriage-strengthening initiatives ... programs even with very modest success rates will be cost-effective,' the study says."

This is a blatant and expensive "look, there's Elvis!" attempt to account for debt, a diving dollar and a devious administration that squanders the amount of money stated here as being lost annually to divorce and single parenting ($112 billion) more than twice a year to fund the war in Iraq (AFSC, see this article). It is an ignorant, sexist, simplistic and poorly justified attempt to explain away the cataclysmic problems of institutionalized racism and sexism and privilege innate in this country's operations. Marriage will solve these problems? Marriage will get kids off the streets and out of jails, will pay the bills and alleviate the need for social services?

Did the authors ever think that our society's deeply founded push for marriage may exacerbate these problems? That the innate hypocrisy within the predominant Christian-based laws of this colonized country may push people who aren't ready for marriage into the institution, either for the tax benefits, or to satisfy their familys' indoctrinated religious beliefs, or to avoid the scrutiny American society points at unwed, child-bearing couples? And that perhaps that societal and legal push may increase the instances of domestic abuse, child abuse, poverty and the need for social services?

My sister used to attend bible camp with her childhood friend so as to provide a voice for the moral atheist on creation and sin. Perhaps I, the bastard child of a couple who spent 18 years together, currently attending graduate school with the aim of working for oppressed communities who have been stripped of a voice and basic rights in this society, will sit in on some of these marriage counseling sessions. Please. Tell me again how the absence of a marriage license between my parents cost taxpayers "a ton of money," and "is a legitimate concern of government, policymakers and legislators."