ONE in three marriages ends in divorce. There, I’ve said it. A week before I trip up the aisle, even admitting this to be true feels like a mini-betrayal.
Here’s another fact that I’m uncomfortable about sharing with you: 40 per cent of divorced women over 65 are poor enough to qualify for income support. There are plenty more statistics I could throw at you about the paucity of women’s pensions and the havoc wreaked by divorce on the finances of women who are not married to magnates, bankers or footballers.
But writing about this is awkward, with the vicar’s words at our last pre-wedding meeting still fresh in the mind: words about marriage representing a glorious triumph of faith, hope and optimism. It’s difficult to revel in the mutual trust we’re announcing to the world if I’m mentally calculating the cost of my partner’s future mid-life fling. Or mine.
There is a danger that the betrayal inherent in admitting even the slightest possibility of failure encourages women to cede control of their finances to their husbands. If it is for ever, what does it matter if all the savings are in his name? What’s his is yours, right? Well, up to a point. Divorce courts can divide assets, but the results are nearly always messy. There is no escape from the statistics about the poverty facing older, divorced women. Women often avoid the courts and settle for less to avoid the bitterness of the courtroom spilling into their children’s lives.
In the days when women used to promise to “obey”, men used to “endow” all their worldly goods. Now that they “share” all their worldly goods, marriage has become more of a partnership, but it remains a financially unequal one.
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The disparity is partly a matter of choice, with women preferring to spend on their family rather than save. But the persisting gender gap on pay does not help. Women are still more likely than men to have lengthy career breaks. Most men still scorn the title house-husband, although the only one I know is also the only heterosexual I know who is man enough to have seen Brokeback Mountain.
For the record, I have no plans to turn my back on marriage and motherhood to be alone with my bank statements. Despite the pessimism of these words, I have never been more optimistic or excited. I fully expect to be laughing and fighting with my husband to the day they bury us. But I also expect to have a measure of financial independence — my own pension, my own savings.
You can put up to £3,600 into a stakeholder pension, regardless of how much you earn. The pensions of women who look after their children full time can be funded for one sixth of the cost of hiring a nanny in London. From April 6 you can put £215,000 into a pension. In the best-case scenario, this gives you two pensions and two sets of tax breaks from the Government.
My husband may not retire, instead becoming one of those deaf judges who make the tabloids with ridiculous questions about popular culture. I want my own pension so I can choose to do some geriatric globetrotting without having to ask for the means.
The advice columnists witter on about having your own interests and being independent within a marriage. But if you have financial independence, or the means to achieve it, a marriage is a choice that you constantly reaffirm, rather than a money trap.
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ANTONIA SENIOR