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There is no marriage benefit from the IRS.

There is a “Marriage Penalty” in the basic tax code, due to the fact that once married, you are treated as a family unit (whether you file jointly, or “married filing separately”). The earnings of the spouses are added together to determine the tax. This means that the entire 2nd spouse’s earnings are taxed at the tax rate as high or higher than the highest of the 1st spouse.

So, two people living together in the same house, sharing expenses, each with an adjusted income of $100,000, would pay $21,454, or $42,908 total on their $200,000.

But if those two were married, and with no separate tax tables, they would pay $200,000*0.33-$15472=$50,528.

With the marriage “relief”, they pay $200,000*0.28-12221=$43779.

Note that is about $800 more than if they filed separately.

Now, if only one spouse works, then the marriage tax rates seem to help — except if you were two single people, and one of you made no money, the one making no money would likely be on assistance, getting food stamps, if they had a small amount of earnings they could actually get the earned income tax credit. So it is quite possible that what they received from the government would make up for the extra tax the earning part of the couple made.

Now, you are correct that social security is one of the big pots. Although if you had similar earnings, it will likely work out that getting your own SS will pay more than getting half of the other earner. Again, if only one earns, you could make out better.

Most companies now offer domestic partner coverage for insurance, and for pensions, so that isn’t really an issue with gay marriage (and I think Obamacare requires it). And I never really considered the death tax thing, although that would only matter if you had more than $5 million, since you can pass that much on tax-free to anybody.

And for most other things, you can legally set up a financial coupling.

I really don’t think it is about money. I think the money is a false reason given to make us think it is “unfair”. I think it is simply that gays want to be fully accepted as normal, they want everyone to be forced not to tolerate them, but to actively support them.

I also think gays do want to own kids (and I mean “own kids” — it isn’t just gays either, there are people who look on kids as another thing to “have”, not as obligations to love and nurture). And it is easier to own kids if you get to steal “marriage”. This is how some lesbian in Vermont got to take custody of some other woman’s child, even though she had no biological attachment to the kid. Because the mother stupidly got “married” in Vermont to this lesbian, and then realised she wasn’t a lesbian, and wanted to get a husband, and then didn’t like what the lesbian was teaching her child.

This is what I think they want. To have ownership of children, and acceptance and support for their lifestyle.

Imagine if addiction to smoking was treated like addiction to same-sex attraction. Both are considered to have genetic components. But if smoking was treated like gays, not only would there be no tax on cigarettes, but people who were mean about smoke would be attacked, bans on smoking would turn into pushes to have buildings designed to help smokers, and we’d be teaching our children to tolerate and support their smoking buddies, rather than turning them off to smoke.

And oddly, smoking probably is less likely to harm your health than active male gay sex. (I am not sure there is a particular medical harm to typical lesbian “sex”).