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Marriage Equality Could Mean a $9.5 Billion Windfall

posted by Tiffany Rauch-Dickson

on Tuesday, June 16, 2009 at 2:41 pm

The $9.5 Billion Gay Marriage Windfall
from Forbes.com

If same-sex marriage were legalized nationwide, the lackluster wedding industry would perk up fast.

Howls of protest erupted last month when California’s Supreme Court upheld Proposition 8, stripping gay and lesbian couples of their right to marry. Adding to the din: all the disappointed planners, seamstresses, jewelers, travel agents and caterers who comprise the massive yet plodding American wedding industry.

There are 781,267 same-sex couples living together in the U.S., according to the Census Bureau’s 2005-07 American Community Survey. The Williams Institute, a research arm of UCLA’s law school, predicts that if gay marriage were legalized nationwide—only Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, Vermont, Iowa and (as of earlier this month) New Hampshire allow it now—about half of those couples would tie the knot within three years.

Talk about a stimulus package. While wedding-related revenues—snagged by small shops to giant corporations like Tiffany, Williams-Sonoma and Marriott International—top $160 billion (an average wedding now costs $20,400), the industry has shrunk at an annualized 1.9% rate after inflation since 1999. If half of the same-sex couples got hitched, Forbes estimates that the industry would reap nearly $10 billion in additional revenue.

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