American Women Are Giving Up on Marriage (Wall Street Journal)

[Anonymous]

The Wall Street Journal profiled single women who are concerned about money and children.
https://www.wsj.com/lifestyle/relationships/american-women-are-giving-up-on-marriage-54840971?st=i8f72H&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink/

Katie, who is 30 and runs Lume, a leadership coaching startup, out of New York City. Katie spent the first half of 2024 going on three or four dates a week with men she met on apps, such as Hinge and Bumble ... calling it “the only thing you can put 10,000 hours into and end up right where you started.”

Christina, a 31-year-old wildland firefighter in rural Republic, Wash., who didn’t go to college. ... paid $90,000 for a two-bedroom ... "so I don’t feel like I need to be tied financially,” ... doubted she would find someone else who aligned with her progressive views in her conservative town. So she stopped looking. “If I need companionship, I volunteer at the dog shelter.”

Alicia's last long-term relationship ... “wanted the white picket fence and me at home with the kids,” ... despite the fact that her salary was nearly 50% higher than his.

Rachael, a 33-year-old real-estate agent in Savannah, Ga., ... left her boyfriend because she was tired of being both the breadwinner and primary parent.

Tina, who is 34 and works for a health startup ... splits her time between New York City and San Diego, has lately spent hours researching the “Single Mothers by Choice” movement and started saving for a baby with a high-yield savings account.

[Anonymous]

Did you mean to write that they are concerned about marriage and children? Because none of these women seem particularly concerned about money

[Anonymous]

Women are not buying into a system that hates them and sets them up to fail.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Women are not buying into a system that hates them and sets them up to fail.

+1. The excerpts are women who aren't settling for the wrong person just so they can be married. Good for them.

[Anonymous]

Your material standard of living might be higher with two incomes, but you’ll be unhappy and unfulfilled in a bad relationship. I’m glad that women have a choice to get into a serious relationship/get married or not. And they could always get a roommate to share expenses if needed!

[Anonymous]

Those women are not settling for men who are not compatible, full partners. Nothing wrong with that. It sounds like if any of them met the right guy, they'd consider marriage.

But, doesn't that mean men are giving up too? The population of the U.S. is 50.5% female. If they aren't getting married, neither are men. Or is something going wrong with a large portion of the male population making them incompatible marriage partners?

[Anonymous]

And yet.... my 3 kids are in their early twenties and are going to/ participating in multiple weddings each this year. There is also a trend of people getting married younger, as in before 30.

[Anonymous]

Isn’t Lume vag deodorant?? lol

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Those women are not settling for men who are not compatible, full partners. Nothing wrong with that. It sounds like if any of them met the right guy, they'd consider marriage.

But, doesn't that mean men are giving up too? The population of the U.S. is 50.5% female. If they aren't getting married, neither are men. Or is something going wrong with a large portion of the male population making them incompatible marriage partners?

Both genders are becoming increasingly unattractive to the other. You have more men growing up to be directionless incel losers, you have more women becoming fat and having delusional standards.

Politics is more extreme now so conservative men and liberal women are finding decreased ability to find common ground. Economically men are losing their appeal, women need them less and they have less to offer in the first place. Socially, there are fewer places to meet in person so we see increased use of online dating which is a very harsh environment and fosters the idea that everyone you meet is disposable, top 5% of men rake it in while bottom 95% get next to nothing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And yet.... my 3 kids are in their early twenties and are going to/ participating in multiple weddings each this year. There is also a trend of people getting married younger, as in before 30.

Among wealthy people, yes.

[Anonymous]

Marriage is a losing proposition for a lot of higher earning women. They do most of the housechores, childcare while still earning more.

Would a man want to sign up for a marriage where he does most of the housechores, childcare, and bring home most of the income? I don't think so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Isn’t Lume vag deodorant?? lol

Care to elaborate on why you find this funny?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And yet.... my 3 kids are in their early twenties and are going to/ participating in multiple weddings each this year. There is also a trend of people getting married younger, as in before 30.

Among wealthy people, yes.

No, it’s a Southern thing, not common amongst the upper middle class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And yet.... my 3 kids are in their early twenties and are going to/ participating in multiple weddings each this year. There is also a trend of people getting married younger, as in before 30.

That doesn't make any sense in the context of the article.

First, getting married before 30 isn't a trend...it has been that way literally since they started compiling statistics. The median marriage age for men is 29 and women 28...and that's the highest it has ever been in the US.

Some other quotes from the article:

The share of women ages 18 to 40 who are single—that is, neither married nor cohabitating with a partner—was 51.4% in 2023, according to an analysis of census data by the Aspen Economic Strategy Group, up from 41.8% in 2000.

In a 2023 Pew Research Center survey of 5,073 U.S. adults, 48% of women said that being married was not too or not at all important for a fulfilling life, compared with 39% of men—up from 31% and 28% in 2019.

[Anonymous]

They've shown that men still do fewer chores even in households where women earn more.

I personally know three different women where they by far out earn their husbands but their husbands aren't picking up any slack at home. One ended up divorced, one I think is on the verge of it.