Wallet Issues

caffection.com

Jackie Mason famously said "I have enough money to last the rest of my life--unless I buy something." Joking aside, most of the world's woes seem to center around money, and specifically the lack of it. Which brings us to today's topic, and in a timely fashion, because we also address the state, and the State of California, which is on the drop edge of being flat broke, as in insolvent. Why bring this up just now? California has also recently (infamously) reasserted the discriminatory stance of marginalizing an entire segment of their population. This got us to wondering how much it costs to have all those county clerks processing all those marriage licenses. Bear with me here. It costs $45.00 to get married in California. Now the document, even with all its seals, stamps and other froo-frah, likely costs a buck, tops. So $44.00 of the cost is clerical--overhead on the courthouse, the clerk's time, various recorder's times, and perhaps a bit of time for someone to file things nice and neat. There were 225,700 marriage licenses issued in California in 2007. Tot that up, and it equals about $10,000,000. Not a lot of dough. But here's the thing. If 18,000 gays married while the law was actually sane and reasonable, there's a potential for a lot more support at the county clerk's office without such obstacles as prop 8. And if gays leave California to marry, that revenue is lost, gone, adios. And that doesn't mention catering fees.