Laura Rowley Money & Happiness

Creating a successful marriage is hard work. So it's nice to know you're getting paid for it. That's the word from a researcher at Ohio State University, who found that people who walk down the aisle and stay hitched accumulate nearly twice as much wealth as those who are single or divorced.

Economist Jay Zagorsky of OSU's Center for Human Resource Research, tracked the financial and marital status of more than 9,000 people from 1985 to 2000. Married people amassed an astonishing 93 percent more than single or divorced people over the 15-year period.

Wealth was defined as a participant's total assets, such as bank accounts, stocks, bonds, and real estate, minus outstanding debt, such as a mortgage. The data came from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, a study funded by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics that has repeatedly surveyed the same individuals over time.

Conjugal Economies of Scale

According to the report, which was published in the Journal of Sociology, people who married and stayed married showed a sharp wealth expansion after they wed, growing to an average of about $43,000 by the 10th year. For single people, assets grew from less than $2,000 at the start of the survey to about $11,000 by the 15th year.

Those who divorced saw their wealth shrink by 77 percent -- a larger decline than would occur by simply splitting a couple's assets in half.

"You lose economies of scale in divorce -- you need two places to live, two cars," Zagorsky explains. "Divorce is quite expensive, paying for lawyers and court fees. Divorce is also time-consuming. It may take time away from work, which also reduces many people's incomes." In addition, divorce weakens the incentive to work harder in the future, particularly if a percentage of income is garnished to pay alimony.

On the other hand, wedded bliss has rich rewards: Married people boosted their wealth by about 4 percent each year just as a result of being married, with all other factors held constant, Zagorsky says.

"For the majority of people, wealth tends to be built up from savings, and savings is the difference between income and expenses," Zagorsky notes. People who live together spend less and save more. For instance, the Bureau of Labor Statistics tracks actual spending in its Consumer Expenditure Survey. It found that while a single person spends $25,423, a two-person family spent $45,855 -- only 1.8 times the amount.

Insights From a Long Marriage

But it's not just cheaper housing and utilities. After 13 years of marriage, I have developed my own 'scientific' theories of rising wealth among the married.

First, the "I-no-longer-have-to-impress-her/him" factor: When we were courting, my husband had a closet full of preppy shirts, striped ties, and khakis. Now he pretty much wears the same blue New York Giant's sweatshirt and Gap jeans all the time. I haven't worn perfume since the first Bush Administration.

The "no-longer-on-the-prowl" factor also helps: I shell out a lot less often on $7 margaritas in smoky New York bars (they actually were smoky when I was single). Splitting a six-pack of beer is much more cost-effective.

Finally, the "we're married-we're boring" factor, which explains why we haven't seen a first-run movie since "Pretty Woman."

Theoretically, with all the money we're saving, we should be retired. Unfortunately, most of the cash we spent looking fabulous in smoky bars now disappears at places like Disneyworld, since we have three kids.

Valuations from Mars and Venus

While staying together makes you rich, money is also, ironically, the factor that most frequently puts a union asunder. In a separate study published in the Journal of Socio-Economics, Zagorsky found that women argue with their significant others about money more than any other topic (including love, children, in-laws, leisure, drinking, chores, other women, and religion).

Why? Because they don't agree on how much money they have. Zagorsky found clear gender differences in how men and women perceive their wealth.

If they have a house and car, for example, the man will tend to focus on the hard assets (what they own), and the woman, on the mortgage and car loan (what they owe). Men typically value the assets higher than women; wives tend to estimate the debts as larger. The researchers were unable to conduct forensic accounting to see who was more accurate in reporting -- but the perception differences were real.

For instance, the typical husband says the couple earns 5 percent more income and has 10 percent more total wealth than his wife reports. Meanwhile, she says the family's debts are $500 more than her husband reports.

Among older couples surveyed, half differed in their wealth estimates by more than $14,700 -- and 10 percent different by a shocking $113,000. Among younger couples, half differed in their wealth estimates by $7,000, 10 percent differed by more than $31,000.

The differences could not be attributed to the dated notion that wives were kept in the dark about family finances. Husbands paid the bills in their families only about 40 percent of the time; wives, 60 percent.

Perhaps the most important finding: Couples who didn't divorce were more in accord on their estimates than couples who divorced. In other words, they knew how to communicate.

Open the Books

So if you want to stay married and enjoy the wealth that accompanies it, sit down with your beloved and open the books before you tie the knot. Such a discussion can reveal things about a potential partner that may justify a case of cold feet. A few suggestions:

• List all of your accounts and look at your combined asset allocation to ensure you're not overexposed in one area -- especially if you work for the same employer and hold company stock in your 401(k).
  
• Come clean about your debts. Once you're wed, you're both legally responsible for them, so decide upfront who will pay them off and on what timetable.
  
• A clash of money personalities -- a spender and a saver, for instance -- should be worked out sooner to avoid conflicts later. The spender should try operating on a weekly allowance. To avoid making this partner feel like they're in third grade, he or she should be able to spend the money on whatever they want. But when it's gone, it's gone.
  
• Once you're legal partners, get new beneficiary-designation forms for all your accounts. Consider life insurance if you have large debts or a sizeable mortgage; buy it as soon as you're expecting children.
  
• Open a joint checking account to pay the big household bills (contribute the same amount or percentage of income), and keep individual accounts for personal spending. Talk about how much is O.K. to spend without consulting your partner.

One upbeat note from Zagorsky's research: Bickering about money diminished significantly over time. Because when you're getting rich, who needs to argue?