Why it’s so expensive to be single in the U.S.

There’s a good chance there are singles in your area. Nearly half of adults in the U.S. are currently single. 

The 117.6 million unmarried, divorced or widowed Americans older than 18 account for 46% of the population, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.

That number has been growing slowly but steadily since the 1960s. As more adults are finding themselves single or remaining unmarried for longer, many are feeling crushed by the total weight of living expenses, which have also continued to grow in recent years. 

“The majority of my friends who are single and living alone are stressed about the cost of living,” Kaishon Holloway, a single man living in New York City, tells CNBC.

While it can play a significant factor for people trying to find a relationship, paying for dates isn’t the reason single people may struggle financially. On top of being solely responsible for living costs that couples can split, single people are excluded from several financial benefits reserved for married couples. 

Here’s what the “singles tax” looks like in the U.S.

Dollar for dollar, it is cheaper to be in a one-person household. After all, there’s only one mouth to feed, one person using household essentials and the home only needs to have enough space for one body.

But when you add it all up, maintaining a single-person household doesn’t cost exactly half of a two-person household. That’s why it’s called the singles tax — it costs more to be on your own than it would for you to share costs with a partner.

Take South Carolina, for example, which falls around the middle of all states in terms of cost of living, according to the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center.

Here’s the cost of a year’s worth of typical expenses before taxes, including necessities such as food, housing, medical care, transportation and more, in South Carolina, according to estimates from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology:

• Single-person household: $29,880 a…