Federal Judiciary

KATHRYN JEAN LOPEZ: Could the economy help marriage?  
 
W. BRADFORD WILCOX: The Great Recession may be fostering a renewed appreciation for marriage and family life. Although thousands of couples have been hit hard by foreclosures, unemployment, and shrunken 401(k)s, other couples seem to be pulling together in the face of the economic challenges now facing the country. 
 
One indication of this is that divorce is down (modestly) in the first full year of the Great Recession. Scholars disagree about why this is the case. Some think couples are simply postponing a divorce until the economy rebounds. Others think that the recent divorce decline is part and parcel of a larger divorce decline that began in 1980. But I think part of the story here is that a large minority of couples are developing a renewed appreciation for the social and economic support that marriage and families can provide. 
 
Another silver lining associated with the current recession is that thrift seems to be making a comeback. Americans have shed almost $100 billion in credit-card debt in the last year; they are cutting back on consumer spending; and they are producing more goods (food, clothing, etc.) at home. This is important because married couples who acquire financial assets and steer clear of credit-card debt tend to enjoy happier and more stable marriages. And families that produce goods together also enjoy more solidarity. In other words, the family that bakes, gardens, and sews together, stays together. 
 
In sum, for many Americans, today?s tough times may have inspired a new dedication to financial good sense and family togetherness. 
 
 
LOPEZ: Are we really in the midst of a mancession? Why don?t we hear more about it?  
 
WILCOX: Yes, we are in the midst of a ?mancession.? About 75 percent of the increase in unemployment since the Great Recession started has fallen on the shoulders of men. Moreover, The State of Our Unions indicates that working-class men have been hit hardest by increases in unemployment since the recession began in late 2007 -- and the phenomenon has garnered some attention in a number of media outlets, in fact.

LOPEZ: How do you know rising male unemployment will hurt marriage?  
 
WILCOX: There is no way to know for sure that the mancession will hurt marriage. Sociologist Christine Whelan thinks it could be good for marriage, insofar as it could encourage couples to adapt a more egalitarian approach to marriage and family life. 
 
But my own research indicates that men who are married to wives who outwork them are 61 percent less likely to report that they are ?very happy? in their marriages; they are also more likely to entertain thoughts of divorce. I think most men experience unemployment, especially long-term unemployment, as a blow to their sense of self-worth and to their sense that they are a good provider for their family. 
 
As importantly, wives are more likely to lose respect for their husbands if they suffer long-term unemployment. All this can lead to a downward cycle of conflict, recriminations, and financial difficulty that leads to divorce court. So, in the current recession, my sense is that the couples who have seen a husband lose his job are the most vulnerable to marital failure. 
 
LOPEZ: Is this a bit of a gift to feminists, putting women on top?  
 
WILCOX: Some scholars, like Whelan, think that it may be. But research suggests that men and women are happier in their marriages, and less likely to divorce, when the husband has a decent job. 
 
So, at least for ordinary women, there is still a premium on having a husband who is gainfully employed. 
 

LOPEZ: So what should we be doing? How do you hold these hurting families together, and who should be doing it?  
 
WILCOX: First, we should pursue public policies that bring unemployment down -- especially among working-class men. This also means strengthening vocational education in the U.S. and pushing fair-trade policies that protect our workers from unfair competition abroad. 
 
Second, religious, civic, and public institutions should provide social, emotional, and financial support to families that are suffering in the current recession. 
 
LOPEZ: Are marriages better among families where the husband has a college education?  
 
WILCOX: They are not necessarily that much happier but they are a lot more stable. Sociologist Steven Martin estimates that the divorce rate among college-educated Americans is about half the rate of divorce among Americans without college degrees, and he points out that the ?divorce divide? between these two groups has been growing in recent years. 

As I pointed out in ?The Evolution of Divorce,? this is in part because college-educated couples enjoy husbands with better financial prospects and in part because college-educated couples have taken an increasingly dim view of divorce since the height of the divorce revolution in the late 1970s. 
 
The bottom line is this: College-educated couples are more likely nowadays to have the financial resources and the normative commitment to marriage to ride out marital difficulties and challenges.
 
 
LOPEZ: What does it mean to say that marriage is one of society?s best social-insurance plans? How is it playing out? 
 
WILCOX: If you look across time and space what you see is that marriage and kinship have been vital in helping adults and especially children gain ongoing access to food, shelter, and other needed resources. With our recent focus on a soulmate model of marriage, we have tended to downplay the social and economic realities of married life. 
 
But today when you are depending on your wife for medical coverage, or your in-laws for a place to stay, or your husband for help with the bills, you are more likely to appreciate that marriage and family is about more than an intense sense of emotional or romantic connection. Marriage is also about making sure that someone else is looking out for your social and financial well-being. 

LOPEZ: You report that husbands who work fewer hours than the wives are less likely to say that they are ?very happy? in their marriages then men who work as many or more hours than their wives. Should they just get over that?  
 
WILCOX: No, I do not think so. This issue of male employment is especially salient for men and women when there are children in the home. The reality is that even today, men tend to focus more on providership and women tend to focus more on the home when there are children in the home (even when both spouses work outside the home). And, on average, both men and women prefer it this way. 
 
So if we are concerned about the welfare of married couples with children, we need to do more as a country to make sure that men have access to decent jobs that help them make important contributions to their family. 
 
Let me be clear: I am not saying that women and mothers should not work. But research suggests that the work of a husband is especially important for the welfare of his marriage and family when there are children in the home, in part because most mothers would like to focus more on nurturing than working full time outside the home.   
 
LOPEZ: What?s the most important thing to come out of the State of Our Unions report this year?  
 
WILCOX: One of the key ideas in the report is that our country depends upon strong nests (marriages) and nest eggs (assets -- including homes) and the virtues and institutions that sustain strong nests and nest eggs.

What is clear in this report is that the nests and the nest eggs of working-class families in the U.S. are increasingly fragile. Nonmarital childbearing, divorce, and male unemployment are all up in working-class communities in urban, suburban, and rural America. This means that the lower half of the middle class in America is in serious trouble.  
 
 
LOPEZ: What can we do about that? Again, who should be doing something about it? 
 
WILCOX: In brief, political leaders, journalists, and civic leaders need to push a centrist, opportunity agenda that is focused on strengthening marriage, employment, education, and thrift in middle America. But I would need another interview to flesh out this agenda.

Full post as published by Bench Memos - National Review Online on January 05, 2010 (boomark / email).