Some Models for Dowry Calculation

Background

This thought came while I was busy refuting a blogger whom I had met in the cyberspace through a common friend. She had written something about matrimonial ads and had bashed up mankind very unkindly through politically correct language. Added to that were some psychopaths who had boosted up her ego without a critical thought on her writting and made her believe that she was championing the cause of women. Well what followed in a nutshell was that I engaged myself in a debate with her and when she saw the ground beneath her slipping, she gave a few lectures to me on humilty and respect and vanished away with a huff! Well insecure people can never sell secure ideas. 

Anyway I dedicate this piece of writing to that very individual who provided the much in demand food for thought for these models to germinate in my cerebral space. 

Approach 1- An econometric model for dowry calculation

Problem definition: Marriage can be defined as a transaction of goods, services and emotions between partners.

 

The variables for transaction and the means to measure them: Three variables I am taking for defining transactions - goods, services and emotions.

1- Emotions can be measured as EQ of each partners and a correlation of them can be entered in the model

2- Services can be measured as the "number of trips/month" to finalize the match. In affection marriages its usually very high since lot of convincing stuff to make the families agree has to take place

A note on affection marriage - The term affection marriage has been coined by me to define what is called as love marriage by the blind-in-love mortals. This is because these love marriages are the ones which provides the fodder for the numbers to swell up the divorce registers. My question is, "Can love end?" After lot of debates and arguments with self and critically observing such affairs (I mean that word!) I arrived at a conclusion - "That love can end if its done with a reason. Anything that is done with a reason ends with a reason." But love is reason-less. And hence what is prevalent before us is affection marriage in the garb of love marriage. I define affection marriage as a time bound emotional contract that builds up between two individuals for a tangible reason. 

3- Goods we can keep as a question. Rather we shall discover how much dowry one must pay to keep the marriage working.

4- This can be regressed against the "nember of years one wants to stay in the marriage" which can be measured as "anniversary".

 

Equation: Anniversary = y + EQ + no. of trips/month + Goods to be given ( y = intercept).

 

This way one can calculate the goods or dowry one has to give/take scientifically.

 

Approach 2- An alternative appraoch

This model is a different way to look at the problem of dowry.

 

Again keeping the same variables as defined previously.....

 1- Anniversary is directly proportional to higher correlation of EQ scores. - This is pretty logical I guess and no need of any explanation.

2- Anniversary is inversely proportional to service exchanged. Now service exchange is defined as no. of trips/month made by partners to satisfy families to agree to their union. Hence this leads to emotional drain and hence emotional loss. Many times they have to abandon their plans and an "affection marriage" fails to initiate. I want to clarify this more. It may happen that the partners may not marry at all to anyone in their lifetime resisting the resistance. But thats beyond the scope of the model. The assumption is the partners do eventually marry each other. It follows the success-only criterion.

3- Anniversary is directly proportional to goods or dowry given/taken. I take a more economic standpoint here. More the dowry got, more the spending/purchasing power of the husband for the wife and hence less percieving of the wife as an economic burden.

 

So the equation becomes: Anniversary = k X EQ X months/trip X goods

 

Facts abt equation (units): k = constant, EQ = no units, trip = measured in kms., goods = measured in Rs (lakhs), Anniversary = years

 

So k's unit is km/Rs (lakhs) (since year and month cancel each other !)

 

I define "k" as the "mile-age constant of a marriage"; and its implications I give below. 

 

Implications:

As one can see, if the denominator, that's goods, increases, the mileage constant decreases, i.e. the distance between the guy and girl (physical and assumed to be emotional) decreases with every extra rupee spent; it means the guy and the girl are ready to bear anything and stay on since a huge cost has been involved. So high dowry marriages are "stable", stability again being defined purely based on no. of years spent together. No taking into account of emotions.

 

Mile age constant has to be decreased for marriage to last - thats the thesis. So one more way  to decrease the "k" is to decrease number of trips. It happens if parents are cooperative and realize marriage is the business of two individuals and all they have the role is to felciliate the union. Hence dowry asked is decreased too. Such marriages are stable provided the EQ of the individuals have a high correlation and assumed not to change over time.

 

Societal implications of the current model:

1- A database of mile-age constants of all marriages in every community and caste can be made. This shall help us in calculating the dowry needed. Hence this shall fecilitate an advance planning by parents.

 

2- If it is an "affection-marriage", well the parents can actaully calculate the trade-off and hence based on the demand and desire can control the number of trips made by the parties for convincing them

 

3- The partners can actually calculate their years of togetherness and this shall motivate them to stay along and hence may increase the potential stability of marriage by making them submit to each other and hence understand each other better.

Approach 3- Dowry viewed as economic asset by the groom's family

Family A will get a bride from family B.

 

The dowry must be calculated based on the most sensitive expenditure of a family that will be affected on getting another girl. Hence according to me its food. Hence one must calculate the avg. monthly expenditure of food of Family A, say "x"

 

Marriage is nothing but can be viewed as transferring of one individual from one house to another permanently assuming the marital status to be infinite. Hence the monthly expenses on food for Family B can be calculated, say "y". Let the family mambers in this family be "a". So "y" can be leveraged on these family members for simplicity. So its "y/a" on the girl for share of expenditure.

 

Dowry is nothing but transferring this "y/a" from Family B to Family A aggregated to the number of years the marital bond lasts.

 

Now the life expectancy for men is 70 years in India (according to WHO report, 2006) and 67 for women. So marriage shall last till both the partners are alive and this is again assuming the bond is infinite and not broken by discord.

 

People marry in modern India at the age of 25 years minimum. So marriage lasts for 42 years.

 

Hence dowry to be paid = y/a X 12 X 42 rupees.

 

This is scientific way of determining again the dowry to be paid and has utility value rather than the show off value.

 

A Note and some concluding comments 

Dowry was never meant to be a contribution to the family's expenditure. Actually there is no justification of people asking such huge amounts. The incremental increase in family's expenses thanks to coming of a girl into its fold is very less compared to the wealth exchanged in name of dowry. Dowry is rather a show of power of individuals to society about the quality of life they are leading. Hence marriages are such expensive affairs. But if you look critically you shall see what we call marriage is actually chanting of a few mantrams and tying a knot. Throw in some new pairs of clothes for the couple. Its darn simple ceremony. Just blown into bits by the show-off. Personally I will love to marry in a court.

I am against dowry and so are many. But yet the system still exists. As a scientist, I love working with reality and not idealism . So refrain from judgements unlike my friend to whom I have dedicated this piece.