Over the next few months we will be hearing lots about income inequality. The president has made that a major theme in 2014. Some trying to score political points will note that income inequality in America has grown significantly when he has been president. But I want to focus on one thing that is effective in dealing with poverty and income inequality. That is marriage.

Ari Fleischer makes the case for marriage in a recent column. He served as press secretary for President George W. Bush and explains that one of the most significant contributing factors for poverty is the breakdown of the family. He even argues that the president who was mostly raised by a single mother and his grandparents is an ideal person to take up the cause.

According the data analyzed by the Beverly LaHaye Institute, poverty is relatively rare in households with two married parents. In 2012, only 7.5 percent of them lived in poverty. Contrast that with a full third (33.9%) of single mother households that live in poverty.

There is every reason to believe the problem will grow worse as we have more and more children raised in female-headed families. A study by the Heritage Foundation found that more than a quarter (28.6%) of children born to a white mother were born out of wedlock. More than half (52.5%) of Hispanic-American children and more than seven out of ten (72.3%) African-American children were also born out of wedlock.

After 50 years of a war on poverty, we have learned that sending checks to families in poverty rarely is able to bring them out of poverty. We have spent over $20 trillion (in current dollars) since 1964, and have not made much of a dent in the poverty figures.

Marriage is a key factor. The Heritage Foundation study discovered that the poverty rate for white married couples was just 3.2 percent and for black married couples was only 7 percent. However, the poverty rate for non-married families was at least five times greater.

If we want to truly address the problem of poverty and income inequality, we need to talk about the importance of marriage.