June 30, 2023
House Republican Plan Penalizes Marriage
We just got more bad news about marriage. A record-high 25% of 40-year-olds in the United States were never married in 2021, according to sobering new statistics from the Pew Research Center. That statistic compares to just 6% of never-married 40-year-olds in 1980, underscoring marriage’s falling fortunes in recent decades. Digging further into the Pew data reveals that this retreat from…
June 22, 2023
Thanks to the Baby Bust, America Is Getting Older
When I was born in 1978, the median American was 30 years old. These days, the median American is 38.9, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Thursday. That’s a rapid aging of the American population. Some portion of that increase is good news: Older people are living longer than they were 40 years ago. In 1980, the average American life expectancy at…
June 20, 2023
Down Through the Ages
How much do we have in common with our children and grandchildren? Less than our parents had in common with us—or at least that’s the theory animating Jean M. Twenge’s new book, Generations. Twenge, a psychologist at San Diego State University, is most widely known for iGen, which chronicled how the rise of the smartphone should be…
June 16, 2023
Marriage Is Still the Best Way to Bond a Father to His Children
Editor’s Note: The following essay is an edited transcript of AEI senior fellow Ian Rowe’s opening remarks at “A Debate on Fatherhood,” hosted by the National Marriage Project at UVA and the American Enterprise Institute on April 25, 2023. The event, which was moderated by IFS senior fellow Brad Wilcox, featured a discussion between Richard Reeves and Ian Rowe on the question:…
June 11, 2023
Now Political Polarization Comes for Marriage Prospects
Marriage rates in America are falling fast: Many men and women are marrying later, and more and more people are never marrying at all. Marriage is in retreat for a host of reasons, but one overlooked cause is the rising difficulty many young people have finding a partner who meets all of their requirements—emotional, physical, financial, and political. That last…
June 2, 2023
America’s Baby Bust Is Back on Track
America’s birthrate has been falling steadily since the Great Recession 15 years ago, and the brief uptick of 2021 proved to be a statistical blip, as new birth data show a small drop in births in 2022. Speculation of a COVID baby boom hasn’t panned out. Provisional data from the Centers for Disease Control and…
May 26, 2023
The Power of the Success Sequence
Introduction The “Success Sequence,” a formula to help young adults succeed in America, has been discussed widely in recent years, including by Brookings Institution scholars Ron Haskins and Isabel Sawhill. The formula involves three steps: get at least a high school education, work full time, and marry before having children. Among Millennials who followed this…
May 25, 2023
Education Freedom and Work Opportunities as Catalysts for Increasing the Birth Rate Among Married Couples
Summary Pursuing new, commonsense approaches to education reform and work–family policies, from childcare and early education through higher education and workforce flexibility, will foster the conditions for family flourishing and increase birth rates for married couples. Affordable childcare from a variety of providers, including at-home options, access to high-quality K–12 education that reflects a family’s…
April 25, 2023
A Debate on Fatherhood
Richard Reeves and Ian Rowe debate the question, “Does strengthening fatherhood depend upon renewing marriage in America?” In his recent book, Of Boys and Men, Brookings Senior Fellow Richard Reeves argues that the institution of fatherhood must be revitalized in order to promote successful outcomes for boys and men, even if it means separating the…
April 17, 2023
Data Tools 6: The Geography of Traditional Families in America
The sixth in a series from Charles Murray. “Every generation, civilization is invaded by barbarians—we call them ‘children.’” These words, often attributed to Hannah Arendt, express a truth that societies have known since societies began: Children must be socialized. Two other truths that societies have instinctively known for millennia are that the birth parents must…