Joseph, the reason for the crisis is the fact that parents are put in charge of their children’s shiduchim and have inapt requirements for their perspective daughter in law. The age gap only serves to allow their demands to be met; hence, the age gap itself is not the issue but rather a means by which to nourish the underlying problem. Having boys dating earlier will not achieve anything, as long as it’s still acceptable for older boys to marry much younger girls. So the only way to stop the ctisis is to either keep parents away from their children’s shiduchim, or to have a more tortuous approach, which would be to somehow outlaw older boys from marrying single girls, which would be extremely insane, and anyway, isn’t what NASI is trying to do.
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