The Real Reason Richer People Marry
4th January 2015
A fine example of what I call ‘horseshit social science’ — basically, an extended example of confusing correlation with causation. (No good reason is given for restricting the treatment to ‘white non-farm U.S.-born men’ except the obvious: that’s the data he had available.)
An example crap conclusion:
College-educated men and women are the privileged players in our transformed economy: They can pool two incomes and provide a solid financial foundation for a marriage. In contrast, we have seen declines in marriage among high school graduates who are stuck in the middle of the labor market, where they can no longer find the kind of steady, decently paying employment that supported their grandparents’ marriages.
While it’s true that having two professional incomes is a Very Good Thing, people rarely marry on the basis of their partner’s contribution to the family wealth pool. If it were, and two such instances of homo economicus were looking at marriage, surely it would be obvious that for those whose income is uncertain pooling endeavors is far more advantageous than going it alone; hence we would expect non-rich people to marry with greater frequency than rich people, just out of a desire for self-preservation. Yet that is not the conclusion.
And this guy works at Johns Hopkins, a premium U.S. university. A more glaring example of the decline in intellectual standards in modern academia would be difficult to find, except that it’s depressingly common.
And why would a respected publication like The New York Times print such a thumbsucker? Because it supports the ‘progressive’ Narrative, of course; All The News That Fits Our Rants is the new motto.