October 30, 2020
To support the Supreme Leader’s policy of boosting Iran’s population, a cleric has proposed making marriage compulsory and levying taxes on those who refuse to build a family.
The proposal has become a hot topic on social media, but doesn’t seem to have garnered much political support. Many are joking about it. The Supreme Leader has been silent so far.
Mohammad Edrisi, a conservative cleric, first aired his ideas in May, arguing that those not married by the age of 28 should face the consequences of higher taxes.
Social media users have ridiculed the idea. One woman said she deserved a prize—a car or a house—because she got married at 18, ten years before reaching the age limit. Another commenter said she worried that the next bill proposed to the Majlis would make motherhood before the age of 30 compulsory.
The Shiite establishment and officials, and particularly Supreme Leader Ali Khamen-ehi himself, keep telling people they must marry and have children. State statistics show the fertility rate has declined since Khamenehi launched his birth push a half-dozen years ago.
Radio Farda observed that many Iranians are reluctant to marry due to economic hardships that have made forming a family expensive. And like everywhere else in the world, there are also people who prefer being single to married. Some others opt for “white marriage”—living as unmarried partners—an official no-no in the clerically ruled country.
The Shiite establishment’s concern about the birth rate is rooted in the clerical ideology of spreading Shiism across the world. The leader of the Shiite world requires soldiers to fight for it, while fewer marriages means fewer children and fewer soldiers and the weakening of Islamic Iran, as they see it.
The proposal to punish the unmarried above 28 would levy a 25 percent tax, with the resultant revenues given to those who want to marry but are prevented from doing so by poverty.
The cleric went into quite a lot of detail: for example, people with illnesses between the ages of 17 and 28 must receive free treatment, and be prevented from marrying if the illness is terminal. Those who are cured of the illness and still refuse to marry should pay all the marriage costs of a couple.
The cleric also proposed to deny unmarried individuals of holding higher managerial positions, teaching in universities and other key positions. The list of incentives proposed to be given to those who do marry is quite long, too. He proposes employment privileges and all sorts of benefits.