Marriage, Cohabitation and Parenthood

I really did enjoy this week’s readings. I found that they were quite engaging and interesting to follow. One aspect of the reading’s I found was the prevalence of the breadwinner role in differing couple relationships.

I both Patterson and Seltzer’s, although articles on different aspects of family life, both indirectly postulate the existence of a breadwinner ideal in both relationships of lesbian and gays as well as cohabiting heterosexual couples. In Patterson, it is found that “older, wealthier men tended to have more power in their intimate relationships” and this finding was found to me the same for older and wealthier women in lesbian relationships. This finding continued into the economic realm for gay couples, but not lesbian couples, in that the wealthier man in the relationship had more power in money management issues. In Seltzer’s article on cohabiting couples, it follows that within cohabiting couples the ones more likely to marry are those when the male is stable economically. As well, couples opt to cohabit over marrying, especially in young couples, when the male’s “economic circumstances are precarious.”

In this time of “equality” when it is now socially accepted to cohabit rather than marry, and in Canada where gay marriage is legal, I found it completely fascinating that so much depends on earnings. In gay couples, being the breadwinner equals more intimate power, as well as in gay couples, more power over finances. In cohabiting couples, it dictates the time of marriage. It is interesting to see that money is such an important and crucial factor in determining the dynamic of a relationship.

I also found Hoschild’s article quite fascinating, and I too was quite offended by the ad. However, what is so striking about it, rather than the over-use of the word sensual, is that he was looking for one person to fulfill many roles in maintaining his household. He wasn’t just looking for a masseuse, or a cleaning lady, or a personal assistant, he was looking for it all: he wanted a complete package. Had he hired a separate person for each duty, it wouldn’t be such a big deal. However, he is looking for one person to fulfill these roles, which seems as though he is looking for a housewife for hire.

1. Were you offended by the ad Hoschild mentioned? Do you think that the commodity he is purchasing truly is purchasing a wife?

2. How important do you think income is when establishing power in a relationship? Do you think children can sense power discrepancies between their parent’s relationship?

3. What I felt was missing from LeBourdais and Lapierre-Adamcyk’s study were enough hypotheses as to why the cohabitation rate in Quebec is so high. Do you have any ideas or hypotheses as to why cohabitation rates are so much higher in Quebec than the rest of Canada? Can you posit a relationship between the trend of cohabiting in Quebec to cohabiting in Sweden?