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If the age gap theory is correct about the cause of the shidduch crisis, then how few shadchanim there are does not help or hurt shidduchim getting done. The shidduchim will get done regardless of how little shadchanim there are. And by shadchanim I am including family and friend non-professional shadchanim. People are getting married. And will continue to get married even if there are less shadchanim and less regular people involved in shachanus.
The theory claims that it is the age gap that is the problem. The boys are getting married but the girls are not. More shadchanim do nothing to alleviate this. And the age gap theory proponents claim that the age gap is the only significant barrier for more girls to get married.
Essentially, starting new shidduchim websites, coming up with ideas to better match guys and gals, making more boy/girl get-togethers (like sponsored by the Agudah’s Invei Hagefen) and other initiatives to get single guys and girls together for a potential shidduch in a more conducive or comfortable environment really do nothing to fix the problem.
Only partially correct. Additional shaddchanim will not do much on a global level, but they can for a Kehillah. Get togethers on the other hand are outside the system, and allow matches that do not “work” on paper, including “age mismatches” (girl older than boy), and bypass the parents (who are the ones who push for younger girls) so those do help.
I am a proponent of the age gap theory, but I don’t think it’s the only issue. There are fewer older single boys than girls, but there are still plenty of older boys, and increased efforts to match singles can help.
Also, some have claimed that the 22, 23, 24, & 25 test old boys all want the same 19-20 year old girls. If that’s true, then more effective shadchanus should get the boys married younger, thus reducing the age gap.
gaw- abiecab joined less than an hour ago. No need to get worked up over anything he says.
Gamanit , under this username.
gaw- abiecab joined less than an hour ago. No need to get worked up over anything he says.
I’m not worked up, but I’ll give the benefit of the doubt for abby cadabby 🙂 It also allows me to get up on my soap box
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1. The OP is correct to a point. You would still need a certain threshold to be able to connect all the connectable people.
2. The age gap theory might have merit, but if it does, the merit is small enough that it should not be something that is addressed by encouraging boys to get married earlier. Here are some reasons why the age gap is misleading:
a. More boys are born than girls. This is a scientific fact. Arguably, this is why men marry younger women in the first place.
b. In the US as a whole, men marry older than women do, by about two years. There is no shidduch crisis in the secular world. And since you are about to say that it’s because people don’t care if they stay single, I will point out that
c. More men don’t marry than women. (This is not really conclusive, I concede, since divorce is far more prevalent among secular society.)
d. Even if it were true that there would be a numbers gap if the numbers didn’t move from the birth rates, the advertisements touting the age gap solution don’t address dozens of factors that are highly relevant and could present solutions that are more beneficial. For example:
i. Not all the people who are born end up using the shidduch system as the movement perceives. Since boys and girls are subject to completely different social and educational environments, there is no reason to assume that twenty years after they are born, they opt into the system at equal rates. If only a few percent more girls opt out of the system than boys, the age gap would turn out to be a myth. Conversely, if a few percent more boys opted out, we would find a solution more easily by correcting that than by marrying people off at twenty. Instead of spending hundreds of thousands of dollars raising awareness for the “age gap”, push more money into addressing early learning problems and you will gain more. Or, spend a bit more money on richuk for girls – that would work too.
ii. Even if it’s true that the age gap is the most pressing and solvable issue, the easiest way to solve it would be through creating an efficient market, rather than through proclamations in the Yated. If the market were efficient, i.e. more people had access to more people, more information were available about the state of the market, etc. then the situation would right itself within a few years. Since most frum people are anti-regulation Republicans, my solution would be far superior to them.
*applauds Veltz Meshugener*
http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/coffeeroom/topic/why-shidduch-kol-korehs-dont-work#post-446788
But I couldn’t say it half as well as VM.
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