JANE EISNER Marriage lessons of Paltrow and Bush

I nominate actress Gwyneth Paltrow for the good sense award.
In December, a week after announcing that she was pregnant with a child fathered by Coldplay musician Chris Martin, the couple quietly secured a marriage license and exchanged wedding vows in a short, secret ceremony in California.
Surely they had the money for something a bit more elaborate, but the party wasn't the point. By joining together when they did, the Paltrow-Martins have given their baby, due this summer, a gift more valuable than any Oscar: The security that he or she will be born into a family committed to each other, legally and otherwise.
I cite this rare example of Hollywood sanity in light of the legion of people lining up to criticize the Bush administration's latest plan to spend $1.5 billion during the next five years to foster healthy marriages in low-income families.
Now, I find the plan problematic because there's little or no evidence (yet) that the programs it will fund actually work to encourage marriage and prevent divorce. Even if they did, I'm not certain this is the responsibility of the federal government, particularly one operating with such a reckless budget deficit.
But the debate seems to have bypassed those concerns and focused instead on the throwaway suggestion that the $1.5 billion would be better spent if handed directly to deadbeat dads and single moms.
"If the Bush administration really wants to improve the lives of low-income people, here's some simple advice: Rather than meddle in their love lives, raise their incomes," writes Laura Kipnis, the Northwestern University professor who recently published "Against Love: A Polemic."
Unfortunately, the argument that poverty and joblessness are the only factors fueling the dramatic decline in the marriage rate defies fact and logic.
It's an argument as faulty as saying that financial issues play no role at all.
The truth is more complicated, as it often is when dissecting human behavior.
Births
This much we know: Nearly one-third of all births in the United States today occur outside of marriage. The proportions are even higher among poor and minority populations: 40 percent of Hispanic and 70 percent of black births are out of wedlock.
Government should care about these troubling numbers not for moral reasons -- I'll leave it to religious leaders to preach morality -- but because the public has a stake in the future well-being of America's children. And research shows that, on average, children do best socially, economically and educationally when raised by two biological parents in a happy, stable marriage.
While real jobs at real wages are as difficult to find in some neighborhoods as an inexpensive bridal gown, financial obstacles are not the only ones blocking the road to the chapel. In his book "The Marriage Problem," James Q. Wilson writes that in the black community, educated, affluent men are no more likely to marry than their poorer counterparts.
Money alone will not cure this problem. The Center for Law and Social Policy analyzed findings from a national study of unmarried parents and, in a paper released last month, said: "Researchers found that relationship quality has a larger effect on likelihood of marriage than employment."
For these families -- and countless other, more affluent ones -- having a child together is not enough of a reason to marry. The decision instead ought to be made on the basis of the quality of the relationship between the two adults. And if they don't feel emotionally ready, well, they'll just wait. And wait.
Marriage education
From this perspective, marriage education makes sense. If a couple can learn how to maintain a relationship, they are more likely to choose to marry and stay married. The White House is right: Money can't always buy love. Couples counseling may be a wise down payment.
It cannot be the only public policy response to the troubling specter of American children growing up in homes that are financially and emotionally unstable. But we have to be honest about the causes of marriage's decline. If it were only about money, the Paltrow-Martins would be the rule in Hollywood and elsewhere, not the welcome exception.
X Jane R. Eisner is a senior fellow at the University of Pennsylvania and a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.