patrick.net

From wikipedia:

Arguments in favour of primogeniture:

Primogeniture prevents the subdivision of estates and diminishes internal pressures to sell property (for example, if two children inherit a house and one cannot afford to buy out the other's share). In Western Europe most younger sons of the nobility, having no prospect of inheriting land or property, were obliged to seek careers in the Church, the Armed Forces or in Government. Wills often included bequests to a monastic order who would take the disinherited. Many of the Spanish Conquistadors were young sons who had to make their fortune in war. In the late 17th and early 18th Centuries, many specifically chose to leave England for Virginia in the Colonies. Most, if not almost all, of the early Virginians who were plantation owners were such younger sons who had left England because of primogeniture laws. These Founding Fathers of the United States of America were nearly universally descended from the landed gentry of England, with many being descended from English Kings of the late 14th and early 15th Centuries, especially through the prodigious offspring of Edward III of England. William Shakespeare's King Lear can be seen as an argument in favor of primogeniture as the tragically flawed action of Lear is dividing his country into three amongst his daughters. The division of his land marks the beginning of the unraveling of everything else in the play.

Arguments against primogeniture:

The fact that the eldest son "scooped the pool" often led to ill-feeling amongst younger sons (and of course daughters). Through marriage, estates inherited by primogeniture were combined and some nobles achieved wealth and power sufficient to pose a threat even to the crown itself. Alternately, one might think that, as with most property, the land will go to its most useful purpose no matter what the initial distribution (the Coase Theorem). Finally, nobles tended to complain about and resist rules of primogeniture (though this opposition might indicate primogeniture among nobles was good for the king).

Primogeniture also can lead to less than able successors. See for example Christian VII of Denmark who was likely schizophrenic and Afonso VI of Portugal who was a half-wit.

A marriage is a life-long commitment made in front of God.

My wife and I were married by the County of Cook in the State of Illinois, before a judge. We've already outlasted nearly 60% of our peers, most of whom were married in churches and synagogues.

I know at least 1 couple who got a legal divorce, but still live as if married purely for tax reasons. They have no children, which uncomplicates things tremendously. CA has no common-law marriage rules, also simplifying things. The taxation difference was tremendous, primarily due to AMT rules. AMT strongly discourages dual-income high-earner marriages. I've heard of others getting divorced later in life (after kids have left) in order to tax manage inheritances when one partner is a high earner and the other is nearing a sizable inheritance. Again, AMT is the culprit. And it's not always just AMT earnings, but often high deductions activate AMT, thereby taxing the other partner disproportionately.

If politicians wish to preach to me about the import of maintaining the "sanctity of marriage", then they can go a long way towards proving the conviction of their beliefs by removing existing disincentives. Otherwise, it is nothing but cynical, shallow, political opportunism.

Peter P,

You believe in God and Karma? Far out!

There is much to endorse in a quick elopment. They're kind of like starting out a business. You'd think the one with high bonding costs (big diamond ring and expensive wedding) would last longer (because of high barrier to entry, or something); but in reality, the cheap elopments don't come with the (debt, social, mutual expectation) pressures of high priced weddings and can work out better.

My wife and I were married by the County of Cook in the State of Illinois, before a judge. We’ve already outlasted nearly 60% of our peers, most of whom were married in churches and synagogues.

Religions, churches and synagogues were created by men.

I do believe that internet will have SOME effect in reducing the stickiness. At least part of the buyer pool is well informed and behave cautiosly. I don't think there is any way of quantifying the effect.

The main reason stickiness will be less this time is the credit bubble. We can say whatever we want to on these blogs. But when it starts pinching the pocket, it is far more effective. Wait till the ARMs reset. Then we can see how sticky the home prices are. Wait till people are under water for 2 years, then 3 years and then 4 years. In this age of instant gratification, patience is an unheard virtue. It takes tremendous hard work, strong will and faith in yourself to ride out the bad times. Our social structure is just incapable of handling a slow death of the housing bubble.

I don't think we will have to wait till 2015 to see 50% loss in real terms. Anytime between 2008 and 2010.

There is much to endorse in a quick elopment. They’re kind of like starting out a business. You’d think the one with high bonding costs (big diamond ring and expensive wedding) would last longer (because of high barrier to entry, or something); but in reality, the cheap elopments don’t come with the (debt, social, mutual expectation) pressures of high priced weddings and can work out better.

I agree. The most important thing in a wedding is cost control.

Oh and BTW, can anyone recommend a perma-bull site/blog for housing ? (Apart from CL, if it can be called as such.)

AMT strongly discourages dual-income high-earner marriages. I’ve heard of others getting divorced later in life (after kids have left) in order to tax manage inheritances when one partner is a high earner and the other is nearing a sizable inheritance. Again, AMT is the culprit. And it’s not always just AMT earnings, but often high deductions activate AMT, thereby taxing the other partner disproportionately.

This is why we must do away with AMT. Throw away most deductions! We need a flat tax.

I maintain that marriage is purely an indefinite contractual agreement for raising kids, sharing expenses, and enjoyment of health insurance.

In cases of marriages with one wealthy elderly party and a sexy younger person of foreign extraction, marriage also functions to take money out of the hands of ungrateful/deserving/awesome because she's SFWoman grandchildren and into the younger spouse's extensive "family."

Oh and BTW, can anyone recommend a perma-bull site/blog for housing ? (Apart from CL, if it can be called as such.)

If you read this site in reverse, you will see perma-bull messages.

I maintain that marriage is purely an indefinite contractual agreement for raising kids, sharing expenses, and enjoyment of health insurance.

Marriage is not indefinite. It ends on the natural, physical death of one or both of its participants.

Oh and BTW, can anyone recommend a perma-bull site/blog for housing ?

Try the NAR or CAR's sites. Although they don't have blogs. Actually, I forget who did it (CNN ran the article), but one of those national realtor(tm) orgs opened up a blog for a while that allowed true anonymity. They were very discouraged to find that the PermaBulls suddenly started admitting a hugely Bearish sentiment, when anonymous.

Can someone enlighten me on what CL stands for?

astrid,

I'm with you on this, insofar as society is concerned. The difference with marriage is what the participants wish to make of it, which doesn't really correlate very well with what the state thinks it should be. But then again, I'm a wacko who believes it's really not the state's business except where concerning the best welfare of children.

According to article 2 of the UCC, a contract that terminates by death or divorce is indefinite. Also, a marriage usually leaves other terms of the contract in the air, such as monetary contributions and willingness to participate in household chores, optimal weight status, etc.

Also, sheesh, and what about Mormon marriages? Huh?

craig's list

There are actually a lot of marriages in the lower classes for SSI survivor benefits.

This is why I feel that governments shouldn’t marry anybody, gay or straight. All cities should do is civil partnerships of whomever, and then marriages should be in churches.

I do not usually associate God with churches or even religions.

The government should still record marriage for various legal purposes.

Peter P, the problem is that arbitrary persons would regard my wife and I to not be legitimately married because it did not have the sanctioning of any particular religious body, nor did we in any way acknowledge the domain of any entity other than the State of Illinois (and thereby the other 49) over the union. SFWoman's suggestion would clearly demarcate legal civil unions from any particular religious or spiritual ambitions. No one would have their civil liberties encumbered. The state could still manage that which it has a legitimate interest, and individuals and their families could manage the rest. The problem is that various arbitrary activists enjoy exerting control over the legitimate behavior of others, for fairly random and ever shifting reasons.

SFWoman,

I hope you weren't offended. It was the sexy foreign grandma that really stirred my imagination. :P As someone who has neither rich forebears nor requisit surgical alterations, I maintain strict neutrality over such matters. As a sometime student of trust and estate law, I find these cases fascinating and quite notable for stupidity of lawyers/judges involved.

SQT,

I'm not against marriage. If I had children, I definitely want to have them within marriage. I agree with the general sentiment here, marriage is what you make of it.

SQT,

Good point about advanced medical directives. Ditto a durable power of attorney (if you can really trust your spouse) and handy list of financial information.

Anyone with children really should take time and think about Will/trusts and appointment of guardians for minor children.

Randy H
And, you don’t have to agree with the thesis of mental accounting to recognize the massive body of empirically supporting evidence for the effect. Put it this way, if mental accounting theory is wrong then vegas casinos and state lotteries don’t make any money.

yes. = 'behavioural economics'

I remember seeing Sandra Bullock in an interview and she said she’d always been ambivalent about marriage until her boyfriend was in a bad accident and she realized she had no say in what kind of care he would receive.

that's the thing. by getting divorced as a tax dodge, you are giving up other automatic next of kin rights of marriage such as inheritance, types of control, etc -- unless you carefully recraft wills and so on -- and it means that you trust the partner not to just fly the coop one day -- after all, you aren't even married...

there was a guru/spruiker here who was always going on about tax dodges, all the usual guru stuff about incorporating yourself, etc. he used to advocate giving up permanent employment to become a contractor at the same workplace to save a few bucks on tax dodges and deductions -- and a few of his disciples took his advice -- without thinking of the fact they could then be terminated at any time without reason with no redundancy benefits, that they had no sick leave or personal leave entitlements, etc -- so they had really thrown themselves at the mercy of their employer by trying to be too clever...

We need a flat tax based on consumption.

Not that again. Maybe we need lifelong conscription into the army, that would solve everything. I don't think a flat tax will ever get up without substantial changes to a lot of other things - many govts these days have ended up with a mix of flat taxes and progressive ones - but i don't think govt could raise enough money to keep itself happy if it switched to a flat income tax system...

DS,

yes. = ‘behavioural economics’

You do know Mental Accounting was Richard H. Thaler, right? As in the groundwork which lead to Behavioral Finance as a science. As in one of the fathers of Behavioral Finance. Or do you just like giving me shit for some arbitrarily sadistic reason?

Peter P, the problem is that arbitrary persons would regard my wife and I to not be legitimately married because it did not have the sanctioning of any particular religious body, nor did we in any way acknowledge the domain of any entity other than the State of Illinois (and thereby the other 49) over the union.

Huh? Religions need not be involved in marriages.

without thinking of the fact they could then be terminated at any time without reason with no redundancy benefits, that they had no sick leave or personal leave entitlements, etc — so they had really thrown themselves at the mercy of their employer by trying to be too clever…

At least in California, as in most other states, employment is "at will". I have been an employer in the state on and off for over a decade. I can terminate people without cause and without reason, so long as it's not provably discrimination against a statutorily protected class. Independent contractors, especially since the mid 90s after the revisions to pre-existing condition/group plan regulations, can usually provide themselves with benefits comparable or greater than available from most California employers. They can't get the best of the best, as in Fortune 100 type benes, but they far exceed the average in cost per value of coverage. I alternate between being an employer and an independently, self incorporated consultant. While self-employed I have always had greater benes, including SEPs et. al. than when an employee of a real company.

I find that people often hold many misconceptions about the limits and practicality of their rights as employees. In California an independent contractor can contest intellectual property invention ownership, an employee may not. The list goes on.

At least in California, as in most other states, employment is “at will”. I have been an employer in the state on and off for over a decade. I can terminate people without cause and without reason, so long as it’s not provably discrimination against a statutorily protected class.

etc

Yes, that's where the Oz guru probably indiscriminately stole his material from -- US gurus. (Gurus are not known to be strong on practical detail.) Over here, you have more employee rights, including the national 'Unfair Dismissal Act', which pretty much requires that you have given 3 written warnings to an employee on an issue before you can terminate, or else suffer repercussions when they sue you.

Futher, the Ralph reforms to taxation came up with the '80:20 rule', that you had to be doing at least 20% of your work for a 2nd party before you could be classed as a contractor for tax purposes -- you couldn't work for someone 100% and claim contractor tax breaks.

However, here you get free national health care regardless of who you work for, I have never heard of an employer offering health insurance as a perk ever, and it's a lot easier just to use your employer's pension plan, altho that's just changed under 'super choice'... The unfair dismissal thing just changed for workplaces less than 100 also, to great agitation -- nobody knows how that will play out yet...

You do know Mental Accounting was Richard H. Thaler, right? As in the groundwork which lead to Behavioral Finance as a science.

aren't i in agreement? jeez, thin skin... :P

Religions need not be involved in marriages.

hmm, yes, there is the religious ceremony and the civil marriage. most of the time religious celebrants are authorised to do the bookwork for the state as well. if you don't do the bookwork for the state, you are not counted as legally married - it's a conditio sine qua non... however, you can just do the bookwork for the state (a 'registry marriage') without bothering with some other rite or ritual of public recognition of allowable sexual relations, heh. i wouldn't bother with a church wedding and all the hooplah, cos i don't believe in it - unless the in-laws made me do it... and i guess such marriages are recognised internationally too - if i got married in germany, that still applies in the US - i can't commit bigamy (unfortunately :cry: )

The amount of propaganda piled on by the media on hurricanes and global warming is staggering.

Katrina hit as a Category 4 hurricane (not a 5) - like 25 percent of all hurricanes. Had one of them hit New Orleans head-on when Teddy Roosevelt was president it would have been just as big a disaster - probably bigger.

maybe there wasn't as much methane and CO2 around when Teddy was president...

But hurricanes are having a large impact on mind share now aren’t they? It’s like getting hit by a wild pitch.

Yes, California has earthquakes. But they don’t name them and have 24 of them a year.

So the weather's turning to shit, climactic patterns are changing latitude, the glaciers are retreating, the snowfields are disappearing and the ice caps are noticeably melting, but global warming is still propaganda? curse that sensationalist lefty latte limousine 10,000 sq ft house-owning liberal press that happens to be owned and run almost exclusively by Repugnants...

here's something by Sir Crispin Tickell:
http://www.crispintickell.com/page92.html

i can’t commit bigamy (unfortunately :cry: )

Huh? Do you even want to?

maybe there wasn’t as much methane and CO2 around when Teddy was president…

DS, have you read Crichton's State of Fear?

SQT, make sure you have a sufficient life insurance policy for your children too.

i can’t commit bigamy (unfortunately )

Huh? Do you even want to?

sometimes... it's the natural state of man...

DS, have you read Crichton’s State of Fear?

crichton's a rotten right-wing apologist for the status quo, probably unintentionally representing vested US industrial interests and the fact that the US with 5% of the world's popn produces 20% of its greenhouse gases. pretty obvious.

especially when you look at recent exceptional hurricanes and cyclones in the southern US, northern australia, floods in central europe, and the possibility of the entire warming Gulf Stream Atlantic currents disappearing... banks in Europe will no longer finance ski resorts under 1500 m altitude... and they're selling off the skifields here asap...

that's the link i was looking for:

http://www.knowthecandidates.org/ktc/BushAnalysis.htm

the little bush jr kiddy's environmental record in texas...

IMO, It is not whether hurricanes are stronger or more frequent

hmm, i think they are changing latitudes too though -- going further north and south in their respective hemispheres... and they're supposed to be more intense as well... could just be due to natural decadal oscillation...

they won't be densely populated areas for long if they keep rollin' in...

"The number of major hurricanes has more than doubled in the last six years. The increase is part of a long-term climate shift that is likely to persist for several decades, said Chris Landsea, a meteorological researcher with the U.S. National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration (NOAA) Hurricane Research Division and co-author of a study on the findings in the July 20 issue of the journal Science. "

national grographic wouldn't lie -
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/07/0719_hurricanes.html

"During the American Revolution, [Benjamin] Franklin is reputed to have proposed the impractical but scientifically tenable idea of diverting the flow of the Gulf Stream to freeze the British."

The strategy's finally worked, 230 years later...

"“During the American Revolution, [Benjamin] Franklin is reputed to have proposed the impractical but scientifically tenable idea of diverting the flow of the Gulf Stream to freeze the British.”"

Ah, Day After Tomorrow scenarios, can I hijack this thread for another Jack Gyllenhaal non sequitur?

"“During the American Revolution, [Benjamin] Franklin is reputed to have proposed the impractical but scientifically tenable idea of diverting the flow of the Gulf Stream to freeze the British.”"

Ah, Day After Tomorrow scenarios, can I hijack this thread for another Jake Gyllenhaal non sequitur?

The Chinese have a saying: If you want one day of unrest, throw a party. If you want a year of unrest, remodel your house. If you want a lifetime of unrest, marry a concubine.

Paying Hamptons or Hawaiian prices for Florida RE always seemed kind of silly to me. Every awake person knows about the constant hurricane threat, the humidity, and the lack of things to do (other than Disney World).

It's kind of like paying full Westside prices to colonize Watts...Or paying house prices for condos...Oh wait, those Miami condos are in bad neighborhoods!

I appreciate all the estate planning wisdom from everyone here. Sadly, we've done just about nothing aside from financial planning. My wife and I are pretty much the first and only from our families to have anything worth planning, so we tend to probably be way to humble about it. Something about the way I grew up tells me that planning my estate means I must be full of hubris. The very word 'estate' doesn't even feel right.

Nonetheless, I'll call my lawyer Monday and get this taken care of. Now if only I can figure out a way to finagle into a Prop 13 legacy property.