In the Good Old Days ;-) Men often had more than one wife. How did they manage it if the sex ration is close to 1:1 ? Did some men have to die Bachelors? This question was raised at the snack-table today at Office.

Me and Ankur had had this discussion before.

In the old days men married late, say at 30, and women married early, say at 15 (numbers from the book 'Roots' which describes (besides doing many other things) life in an African Village sometime in 17th Century).

Consider a village of 60 women and 60 women. Let's say everyone lives upto sixty. Assume a uniform distribution across ages. So there are 45 married women (others are below 15, and hence unmarried). But there are only 30 married men. That means each man has on an average 1.5 wives. So it is possible.

Aliter. Assume a community where men and women marry at the same age. At any time there will be equal number of eligible bachelors and spinsters. Suppose the age of marriage for men is suddenly delayed by 10 years, by a community decision. Since the population is growing exponentially, the men will find many more eligible women after 10 years than were born in their 'batch'. And so will all their 'juniors'.

QED or is there a catch?

If there is not then all the men in this world can by mutual consent postpone marriage by 10 years and then we can all marry more than once.

What say guys?