MEN’S LIVES ARE BEING RUINED, WOMEN HARDEST HIT. “The struggling American man is one of the few objects of bipartisan concern. Both conservatives and liberals bemoan men’s underrepresentation in higher education, their greater likelihood to die a ‘death of despair,’ and the growing share of them who are not working or looking for work. But the chorus of concern rarely touches on how male decline shapes the lives of the people most likely to date or marry them—that is to say, women.”
Never suggested is that women should lower — or modify — their standards.
According to Inhorn, these numbers explain why, today, educated women who want a male partner to parent with are hard-pressed to find someone displaying the characteristics she calls “the three e’s—eligible, educated, and equal” (and, I would add, “eager” to commit) as they seek “the three p’s of partnership, pregnancy, and parenthood.” Egg freezing is, as Inhorn puts it, “women’s technological concession to a U.S. gender problem.”
I hear single women talking about the “three sixes” — at least six feet tall, a six figure income, and a six-inch penis. The Venn diagram where those characteristics overlap doesn’t offer much hope.
Related: Women Find 80% Of Men Unattractive. “Women are often thought of as picky, especially where men are concerned. Some single women are known to have lists of characteristics that their ideal man must possess, like great abs, a sense of humor, a six-figure income, and a nice car. When a woman meets a potential mate, she has to decide which of these traits are deal-breakers and which she can let go. No matter how selective a woman might be, some have strict physical attributes from their must-haves list, as an OkCupid study found that women find 80 percent of men unattractive.”
Plus:
The consensus that emerged in the 1970s that marriage didn't matter and the really important thing for kids was happy parents, the wishful thinking about alternate family structures being just as good and probably better … those were decisions, not natural disasters.
— Megan McArdle (@asymmetricinfo) September 20, 2023