On Marriage, an Economist Bravely States the Obvious

Melissa Kearney worried about being pigeonholed as she wrote ‘The Two-Parent Privilege.’

By Jason L. Riley. Excerpts:

"the institution’s decline has led to a host of economic woes—problems that have fractured American society and rendered vulnerable populations even more vulnerable"

"“the absence of a father from a child’s home appears to have direct effects on children’s outcomes—and not only because of the loss of parental income,”"

"there are strong links between family structure, the well-being of children and outcomes later in life. Daniel Patrick Moynihan said as much in his 1965 report on the black family, and Moynihan relied on research conducted much earlier by black sociologists such as E. Franklin Frazier.

George Gilder wrote about the importance of the nuclear family in “Sexual Suicide” (1973) and “Men and Marriage” (1986). Charles Murray, who had touched on it in his landmark study, “Losing Ground” (1984), made similar arguments in “Coming Apart” (2012). In 1994 David Blankenhorn published “Fatherless America,” and 1996 brought David Popenoe’s “Life Without Father: Compelling New Evidence That Fatherhood and Marriage Are Indispensable for the Good of Children and Society.”"

"Conservatives likely are familiar with at least a few of the aforementioned titles, yet those books in many cases have been denounced or simply ignored by the same left-wing intellectuals Ms. Kearney is trying to win over."

"Ms. Kearney said that writing the book felt like taking “a big risk” professionally because her peers tend to avoid addressing the role of family structure in discussions of social inequality and look down on those who do. “My saying it’s not discussed is probably more reflective of the circles I run in, which is, you know, higher ed, academia, which of course skews liberal,” she said. “And progressive, left-leaning conversations about kids’ well-being and concerns about social mobility—in those circles, in those conversations, I often find that this topic is met with discomfort.”"

"The author reports that in 1960 only 5% of babies were born to unwed mothers in the U.S. In 2019 it was almost 50%."