1. Big family policy news w/ this selection.

@JDVance1 interested in advancing policies re:

✓ Marriage penalties facing w-c families

✓ Minimizing costs of having a baby

✓ Maximizing childcare choices

✓ Expanding child tax credit

@politicopoliti.co/3zI3Ubr 2. @JDVance1 proposed amendment re: the marriage penalty congress.gov/amendment/118t…

Why the concern re: polyamory, asks @justin_mogilski of the University of South Carolina?

It's not about some antiquated hangup.

It's that monogamy is a major social achievement, as Harvard's @JoHenrich's work has shown.

Why does monogamy matter?

Let me count the ways🧵 Men and women are pulled in a variety of sometimes conflicting directions when it comes to mating. Monogamous societies, @JoHenrich's work suggests, channel mating towards pair bonding. What are the collective benefits?

1) Monogamy reduces rape, murder, and social disorder.

1. Fascinating new study from @rlhopcro @unccharlotte:

The relationship between 💵 & key family outcomes (being married, having kids, getting divorced) varies a lot by sex, even today.

@FamStudiesifstudies.org/blog/whose-mon… 2. For

✔️ men, more 💵 = more marriage

✔️ women, more 💵 = less marriage

Source: @rlhopcro @unccharlotte
ifstudies.org/blog/whose-mon…

1. We know smartphones have created big problems for teens, thanks to @jean_twenge @JonHaidt.

But what about adults?

What’s the impact of smartphones on adults?

@WendyRWang investigates smartphones & marriage in this new @FamStudies research:

ifstudies.org/blog/more-scro… 2. One therapist:📱“have caused more upheaval than anything I’ve seen in my career. We’ve normalized them being intrusive & taking precedence when people are lying in bed, playing Wordle or scrolling through TikTok rather than talking to each other.”

Are his concerns merited?

New study:

Happiest men and women in Europe are:

✔️ In *neotraditional relationships* where he works full-time, she works part-time

✔️ Married

✔️ Parents of young children

Unhappiest are:

✔️ She works, he doesn’t

✔️ Neither work

academic.oup.com/esr/advance-ar… Descriptive statistics for satisfaction for European men & women + details

1. NEW: Growing ideological polarization between men/women spells bad news for marriage as

✔️ Y men moving slightly Right

✔️ Y women moving strongly Left

& “fewer Americans willing to date/marry across aisle.”

My latest w/ @lymanstoneky @TheAtlantic
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… 2. @TheAtlantic: In last decade, “Young single men have been moving to the right, even as their female peers have been moving even further left.” theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

"Men need a mission. 'For the average guy, there’s no more important mission than being a husband and a father,'" I told @HadleyHeath. @NRO nationalreview.com/magazine/2023/… A big reason young men are floundering is that the meaning and responsibilities afforded by marriage & fatherhood are not theirs and not even on their horizon. So, there's nothing really to strive *for*. They have no mission in life.

Striking, new evidence young men in America are moving Right:

✔️ Fewer than half of Gen Z men think “feminism has made America a better place”

https://twitter.com/richardvreeves/status/1661466497204596736

This comes on heels of evidence fr @jean_twenge’s new book, *Generations*, which shows HS boys turning right (even as female peers turn left). Stunning ideological divide among HS seniors today:

✔️ @ 65% of HS senior boys conservative

✔️ @ 31% of HS senior girls conservative

1. “The US Government can do nothing to promote marriage”

I hear this a lot from scholars & journalists who point to Bush marriage initiative to advance the claim.

But they’re wrong.

Our biggest federal agency has a long record of promoting marriage.
ifstudies.org/blog/how-the-m… 2. Consider this:

In the U.S. military, officers & enlisted

✔️ Marry at relatively younger ages

✔️ Marry at higher rates

✔️ Witness virtually no racial divide in marriage

ifstudies.org/blog/how-the-m… @FamStudies

1. New from @dcoxpolls: “Close to half (45%) of college-educated single women say their relationship status is largely due to an inability to find someone who meets their expectations.” @FamStudies @AEI ifstudies.org/blog/the-colle… 2. For a majority of single, college-educated women these are dating liabilities:

Being

✔️ Republican
✔️ Not college-educated
✔️ Very religious

Narrows the pool a good bit. Source: @dcoxpolls

1. Been spotlighting👇🏼 *bad news* about Teens & Tech.

But now looks like *good news* coming from Utah.

UT is poised to take lead in treating “Big Tech like Big Tobacco” w/ raft of reform laws designed to help families navigate social media: deseret.com/2023/1/18/2355… @SpencerJCox 2. Utah legislature & @GovCox are responding to research like this report from @jean_twenge et al indicating that Big Tech & social media, in particular, are fueling depression, loneliness, and suicide among teens, esp teen girls: ifstudies.org/ifs-admin/reso…

1. A new analysis by the @AEI Housing Center reveals that one group outperforms all others when it comes to achieving homeownership: married couples. Moreover, this is true for both black and white Americans. ifstudies.org/blog/the-benef… 2. Across entire income spectrum, there is, on average, an approx 20-percentage-points boost in homeownership rates for black & white married households (compared to non-married households) when comparing those of similar income level: @AEI @FamStudies ifstudies.org/blog/the-benef…

1. “Young and middle-aged American men are less likely to be working now than at any time in U.S. history.” @jtrothwell @Gallup has a new take on why this is happening. ifstudies.org/blog/scarred-b… 2. What @jtrothwell is trying to understand is this, the dramatic decline in male LFP since the 1960s:

1. Motherhood is a pathway to misery & immiseration. This is the message much of the ambient culture sends today, esp. since COVID. But is it true?

Actually, no.

@WendyRWang & I survey the data on happiness, loneliness & prosperity @TheAtlantic:
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/… 2. Here's a sampling from the @nytimes, Bloomberg @business, and @Forbes of the negative messaging regarding motherhood and marriage that we've been fed of late:

Responding to @JillFilipovic’s assertion that stay-at-home moms are miserable (see below), @lymanstoneky crunched the numbers. He found:

“Survey evidence shows stay-at-home mothers are… just as happy as other mothers.”

It’s #5 @FamStudies for 2022.

ifstudies.org/blog/are-stay-… “Stay-at-home moms had about the same likelihood of being ‘very happy’ as working married moms.” @lymanstoneky ifstudies.org/blog/are-stay-… @FamStudies

Important debate @AEI:

Are men's economic fortunes falling (which helps to explain decline in marriage)?

Nick Eberstadt says "yes" pointing to rising # men not working (left figure)👇🏽

Scott Winship says "no" pointing to stagnant male wages (right figure)👇🏽

I'm w/ Nick. @swinshi offers his views on men and marriageability here: aei.org/research-produ…

“In Sweden, the paradox of richer people having the fewest children seems to be becoming a thing of the past.” @rlhopcro @unccharlotte ifstudies.org/blog/a-changin… In Sweden, the nation w perhaps the most generous welfare state, a strange thing has happened:

Poor women (and men) are now much less likely to have children than their more affluent and educated fellow citizens.

Same story across much of N Europe, BTW:
ifstudies.org/blog/a-changin…

1. “Why are liberals less happy than conservatives?” 

Noting extra-ordinary differences in how ordinary conservatives & liberals experience family life today. (NB: Not politicians.)

My latest for @UnHerd, unpacking the new @YouGov survey on families. unherd.com/thepost/why-ar… 2. Liberals are about 15 percentage points less likely to be “completely satisfied” w/ their lives, according to new @YouGov “American Family Survey” from @Deseret.

1. Got a new piece out in @Newsweek👇🏼reporting conservative women happier. Plenty of skeptics in my TL. But happiness/mental health findings from @YouGov’s new 2022 American Family Survey on partisan & ideological differences in happiness/mental health are truly jaw dropping 🧵: 2. New @YouGov poll finds *dramatic* differences for men & women by partisanship & ideology in being “completely satisfied” w life:

✔️ Conservatives have 16 percentage point advantage
✔️ Republicans have 10 percentage point advantage

in being completely satisfied with lives.

1. "Guess which group of women ages 18-55 are the happiest?

*Conservative* women.

It turns out they enjoy a 15 percentage-point advantage over liberal women in being 'completely satisfied' with their lives."

My latest for @Newsweek w/ @AlysseElHage.

newsweek.com/why-conservati… 2. Why are conservative women happier?

"advantage can largely be explained by the fact that conservative women are

- 26 percentage points more likely to be married &
- 24 percentage points more likely to be happy w/ family life."

newsweek.com/why-conservati… @NewsweekOpinion

1. "Around 2012, something began to go wrong in the lives of teens. Depression, self-harm & suicide all increased sharply. The increase occurred at the same time social media use moved from optional to virtually mandatory among teens." ifstudies.org/blog/protectin… 2. Unfortunately, Congress and the Courts have "not moved clearly and forcefully to address the harms poised by Big Tech to American teens." @FamStudies @EPPCdc ifstudies.org/blog/protectin…