I got married at age 15. For me, it looked like an escape to a better life

When Gov. Mike Parson signed a bill raising Missouri’s marriage age from 15 to 16 earlier this month, I felt a twang of nostalgia. As a 15-year-old desperately in love with my 18-year-old boyfriend, we crossed the Arkansas-Missouri state line to wed in a judge’s house — with my parents’ permission.

It was 1977, and in our rural Arkansas town, it actually wasn’t that uncommon to wed in your teens. Most of us were on the low rung of the socio-economic ladder, and many others were Hispanic. Marrying younger than the norm was — is — more common in both cultures.

Missouri is one of the last states to raise the marrying age to a more respectable number in hopes of thwarting child marriage and the economic fallout that results. But it hasn’t been that long ago that teens weren’t considered children. They were young adults on their way out of the house.

Now, the standard for 15- and 16-year-olds is to have as many after-school activities as humanly possible, no steady job (no time!) and cross-country plane rides to pick which college has the biggest dorm rooms. Those on the lower end of the socio-economic ladder will stay close to home, maybe get some vocational training, find a job, and become, well, an adult.

For me, marrying at 15 was a poor choice and ill advised, but a policy change won’t automatically shift cultural norms, nor will it elevate anyone’s social class. What the middle and upper-middle classes find alien and hillbillyish, those on the lower rungs see as a way up and out.

We’re in an era that is witnessing the oldest average age of first marriage in history: 27.4 for women, and 29.5 for men. In 1990, the average age of marriage for women was 24. In 1980 it was 22, and back in the 1950s it was barely 20.

But the census stats don’t tell the whole story. The average age of first marriage is much higher in the urban, economically elite Northeast, and lowest in rural areas and the South. The economically advantaged have the luxury of delaying marriage because they have choices that only come with money.

Delaying marriage until we’re in our upper 20s, as is typical today, won’t prevent the economic disadvantages of marrying too young when those who marry young are already economically disadvantaged. While teen marriage is distasteful to mainstream society, many times the decision is made based on current alternatives and future prospects: Getting married at 15, 16 or 17 might not be the best idea, but I’m already living in poverty, so I’ll take my chances.

Legal restrictions on a teen’s (and their parents’) choice to wed will no doubt reduce the external costs imposed on society from those teens’ expected future and continued life of poverty (and also for their children). But for those already in disadvantaged groups, other legislation might be more beneficial. Wider availability of job training, affordable health care and housing can go a long way to reducing the already mammoth class divide and avoiding long-lived poverty.

As for me, I slowly worked my way up and out, finished high school, received job training, found an affordable apartment and landed a decent job. Taking those steps was a much better indicator of my future stability and economic independence than whether I married too young.