Can you restate these, then? I'm having trouble actually finding them. How does giving financial/other benefits to married couples improve society?
Premise: I like living in the best possible society.
Point One: There are a lot of married people in my society.
Point Two: Lots of people having an easier time of things can improve society as a whole.
Point Three: Married people get benefits that make their lives easier, allowing them to better contribute to society.
Point Four: Society improves. I live in society. My life improves.
Conclusion: Providing benefits for married people indirectly makes my life better.
What are you even going on about here? He's saying that marriage (or at least things like marriage) make dealing with illness easier. Do you think they don't? Seriously? Because I've been sick, really sick, when single. And I've been sick, really sick, when not. The two experiences are not exactly comparable in unpleasantness, which was his point, I think.
Then he can get married if he wants to be taken care of while sick. Doesn't really make a difference to me either way.
Maybe you're one of those lucky people who have never BEEN really sick (or who have a whole ton of health insurance so you can pay someone to take care of you for the entire time), but that "social safety net" of having someone there to care for you is definitely a benefit, and I... can't understand where you're trying to take it with this last quote.
I don't even know if either of my parents have any health insurance, truth be told. I generally just try to deal with whatever illnesses I catch, and they haven't required a hospital yet. In fact, the only time I've ever been to a hospital outside of my birth was to check for a cause to some sudden, extreme chest pain that persisted for several hours and vanished on the car ride to said hospital. The doctors there were as useless as I've becomed accustomed to them being over the years, and charged a fairly large sum to tell me they didn't have a clue what my chest pain meant.
I can tell you from experience that it's not exactly a favorable experience getting your wisdom teeth removed and not having someone there to keep an eye out for drug interactions or you falling and smashing your face into a wall trying to get something to eat.
Well, since I'll more likely than not be doing that by myself in around three to five years, I'll tell you how it goes. I certainly won't be eating while it heals, if your experiance is anything to go by. Probably for the best, it seems like it would be easy to get an infection that way. Hell, it can't be all that different from the aftermath of non-surgical tooth removal. I mean, the aftermath of non-surgical tooth removal sucks horribly in every way I can think of, but it's not unbearable.