Men, Money and the Marriage Crisis

by Russ Douthat

MARCH 17, 2015 4:39 PM

http://douthat.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/03/17/men-money-and-the-marriage-crisis/?comments#permid=14443627

Let's face it - societies are changing in directions which favor the skills of women and make traditional male skills less important. Combine that with the fact that men, to an alarming degree, are irresponsible when it comes to participating in the work of raising families - not only in household chores, but in the emotional and physical labor of raising children (witness the alarming ease with which divorced men seem to be able to ignore any real financial or other responsibility towards their children), you get a sense for why "male marriageability" is declining. Then add to that the data (and even worse, the hidden figures) of women being abused by men, and it becomes very clear why more and more women are choosing to not marry, or re-marry.

In this context, to increase "male marriageability" one would have to artificially keep the income potential of women low, even more so than it still is, in order to again make women more dependent on men for pure economic survival. I have no doubt that conservatives, and especially religious conservatives, would be only too willing to implement such "family friendly" policies.