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homes, affairs can become even
more compl icated- and costly.
With inflat ion and increased home
values, a couple can easily go from
being two people in one very nice
home to being one person each in a
small , cramped apar tment. Divorce
can also mean fo rc ing sale at the
wrong time, paymenl of real estate
commissions, prepayment interest
penalties , a nd, i f one or both
spouses t ries to buy again, more
loan fees , commissions and proba–
bly a higher interest rate. Any
number of real estate agents wi ll
tell you divorce is one of the main
reasons for selling homes today.
Taxes can also take a heavy toll
because of d ivorce. Assets often
must be sold to pay off one spouse's
property rights, and the govern–
ment may want to tax any profit on
that sale.
Then thcre are, for a middle–
class family with any substantial
assets at all, the
real/y
heavy cost:
lawyer's, accountant's and apprais–
er's fees. Straightforward d ivorce
cases sometimes cost $5,000, com–
plicated divorces (for the rich) r.an
run as high as (hold your breath)
$25 0 ,000 ! Nat ionwide i n t he
United S tates divorce law is a $3
bi ll ion i ndustry , amounting to
about $3 ,000 a divorce.
And after the divorce, the costs
go on. Two residences, two cars,
dupl icate household expenses, utili–
ty bills, two sets of fu rniture, all are
usually required when one would
have done before. A couple can go
from b"eing relatively prosperous,
middle-class homeowners to each
eking out a rather poor existence in
a small apartment, all because they
were not willing to do what was
Miss Jones, 1 can't believe it! This month-
34
for the jirst time in jive years-1'11 be ab/e to make my alimony and
child support payments and actual/y have
some /eft over for a pair of shoes and a hot mea/!
necessary (basically, have a giving
attitude toward one's mate) to kcep
their marriage together.
No wonder one survey reported
in
Parade
showed, af ter one year of
divorce, 60 percent of the men and
73 percent of the women felt they
had made a mistake in divorcing!
The End of Poverty
Only through keeping the family
units intact has any ethnic group
ever risen out of poverty. When a
community is made up of si ngle
mothers struggling desperately to
raise their chi ldren on a low income,
and rootless, single men who have no
purpose in life other than to enjoy
the present, there will be squal id ,
grind ing poverty.
Stable fami lies are a pr incipi e of
economic success. Young men from
such fami lies grow up realizing that
a man should support his family–
not live a footloose existence as a
pimp, drug dealer or robber . While
it is not fashionable to say it in an era
like today where people dogmatical–
ly insist there are no real sexual dif–
ferences, young men do have inner
need to express their innate aggres–
siveness
somehow.
In this world
today, in particular, being responsi–
ble husbands and fathers channcls
that energy into generally construc–
tive pursuits- steady work, career
building a nd saving. (See generally
Wealth and Poverty,
chapter six.)
In the World Tomorrow, the one
Christ will establish upon H is
return to set up God's Kingdom
over the whole world, people will
be taught God's laws concerning
the family . That world will not
have the suffering-or, at leas t ,
hardship-of a woman trying to
raise her children by herself. l lle-
gitimacy and divorce will almost
disappear from human experi–
ence. And it will be an incredi–
bly prosperous world.
In the meantime, in this
world today, the biblical laws
can be put to work for anyone.
Keeping your marriage intact
doesn ' t guarantee abundance, of
course. But it wi ll help. lnteres ted
readers should write the editor in
chief, requcs ting our free booklet ,
Why Marríage!
and reprint articles,
"Seven Steps to a Good Marriage,"
and "The Care and Feeding of Mar–
riage."
o
The PLAIN TRUTH