Want to Save Money on Taxes?

Gary and Karen have spent 47 years together.

How should policymakers, state legislators, and others respond to the large taxpayer costs of family fragmentation? We note that even very small increases in stable marriage rates as a result of government programs or community efforts to strengthen marriage would result in very large savings for taxpayers. If the federal marriage initiative, for example, succeeds in reducing family fragmentation by just 1 percent, U.S. taxpayers will save an estimated $1.1 billion each and every year.

We can contribute significantly to lower government costs and higher revenues from tax payers by starting a Pre-Marital Preparation Group at our church. We can also help the nation by strengthening family life, especially marriages.

We do not need most therapists but more caring Christians and Pastors who will see that preaching against divorce is half as effective as teaching couples practical way to enjoy their marriages.

Write your Congressman and tell him/her to raise the amount of money given to strengthen marriage and family life.

Stop Family Destruction

Why should legislators and policymakers care about marriage? Public debate on marriage in this country has focused on the “social costs” of family fragmentation (that is, divorce and unwed childbearing), and research suggests that these are indeed extensive.

But marriage is more than a moral or social institution; it is also an economic one, a generator of social and human capital, especially when it comes to children.

In this study, we adopt the simplifying and extremely cautious assumption that all of the taxpayer costs of divorce and unmarried childbearing stem from the effects that family fragmentation has on poverty, a causal mechanism that is well-accepted and has been reasonably well-quantified in the literature.Based on the methodology, we estimate that family fragmentation costs U.S. tax-payers at least $112 billion each and every year, or more than $1 trillion each decade.These costs arise from increased taxpayer expenditures for antipoverty, criminal justice, and education programs, and through lower levels of taxes paid by individuals who, as adults, earn less because of reduced opportunities as a result of having been more likely to grow up in poverty.
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Even very small increases in stable marriage rates as a result of government programs or community efforts to strengthen marriage would result in very large savings for taxpayers.

If the federal marriage initiative, for example, succeeds in reducing family fragmentation by just 1 percent, U.S. taxpayers will save an estimated $1.1 billion each and every year.

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The crisis of family destruction is upon us. If every church in America adopted a small program to support marriages, we could help break the cycle of poverty and increase giving to our own churches.Want to learn how to decrease family break ups? Contact me at gary@sweetenlife.com

Capable Women-Bad Decisions

From an article in the Cincinnati Enquirer on January 10, 2008.


...poverty is a significant problem for women and girls in Greater http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080110/EDIT01/801100319/1090


Cincinnati, and there's no sign it's diminishing. The 2007 Ohio Health Issues Poll showed the percentage of women below the poverty line growing from 16 percent to 19 percent while the number of women at upper-income levels dropped from 62 percent to 59 percent in the last two years.

The Women's Fund of the Greater Cincinnati Foundation is in a three-year campaign to reduce the effects of poverty on local females, devoting half a million dollars to the effort. This week, a Macy's Foundation grant and matching donation from the Charlotte Schmidlapp Fund added $50,000 to the fund.

But how exactly do you take on a problem this large and multidimensional, a problem that trips up women at multiple points in their lives, that siphons off their ability to take care of their families or themselves?

The focus, according to the Women's Fund, has got to be boosting earning power. Women don't do well at the game of financial catch-up. Many spend their lives trying to recover from early decisions that limited their earning potential - entering low-paying fields, getting minimal education, having children at an early age, sometimes jumping from job to job because of family needs.

By midlife, these factors may mean a woman has an unimpressive resume or has been tracked into a career path with little advancement potential. And by retirement, many women have no pension and have not built up savings for themselves.

Committed Couples and Poverty

Poverty is Real around the World

Last night at the monthly meeting of the Organizational Development Network of Cincinnati we heard two great guys from City Cure of Cincinnati talk about poverty. They mentioned that the city of Cincinnati has one of the highest percentages of persons living in poverty in the US. WOW!

When we think of poverty the first thing that comes to mind is a lack of money. That is only part of the problem. The definition offered by Barry Baker of City Cure was broader and more helpful. Chronic Poverty is a "Chronic lack of resources" such as finances, education, emotional balance, supportive relationships, spiritual support, etc. Without all of these resources finances will not last long.

Go to my Brave Heart Blog for the rest of this information.

(See http://garysweetenblogspotcom.blogspot.com/)

The state and federal grants that led us to post this blog have ended and so I am placing the blog on hiatus. I will continue to write on Brave Heart and http://seasonedbelievers.blogspot.com