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Culture War Roundup for the week of December 29, 2025

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The irony for women is that going to college tends to reduce their appeal as mates (not a given, but they tend to make choices that lead there) while making their expectations for a mate go higher.

How does this square with the fact that there's an almost 20 point marriage gap in favor of college educated women? College educated women are worse mates and have higher expectations, but are much more likely to be married? Most of the decline in marriage rates over the last 50 years has been among non-college educated women. Non-college-educated women have seen marriage rates decline from 79% to 52% while college educated women have seen marriage rates decline from 78% to 71%. Empirically, college helps women get married.

How does this square with the fact that there's an almost 20 point marriage gap in favor of college educated women? College educated women are worse mates and have higher expectations, but are much more likely to be married?

That Dataset actually only goes up to the 1990ish birth cohort. Check Page 43 of the PDF

Any shifts that emerged in the past 10-15 years are probably not reflected here.

And the last 10-15 years are when the most drastic shifts have happened.

I haven't found as much reliable data that is more recent, but...

The longer a student is in college — the least likely they are to get married, study says

Study Here

Empirically, college helps women get married.

If they find their partner while in college, this is likely true.

Of course, I'd believe that many non-college educated women are just shacking up with guys and not marrying them too (and popping out the occasional kid), whereas I'd guess college-educated women are just single and childless.

That Dataset actually only goes up to the 1990ish birth cohort. Check Page 43 of the PDF

Sure. It's asking about whether someone was married by age 45 so it is necessarily limited to people who are age 45 or older (birth year 1980 or earlier).

Any shifts that emerged in the past 10-15 years are probably not reflected here.

And the last 10-15 years are when the most drastic shifts have happened.

I'm curious about the precise claim here. For ~40 years between 1985 and the present the fraction of college educated women married by age 45 looks pretty stable around 71% (+/- a couple percent) while the fraction of non-college educated women married by 45 underwent a steady collapse from around 71% to 52%. Is the claim that in 10-20 years, when the current cohort is 45, these numbers will have reversed? There will have been a climb in the fraction of non-college educated women who are married? A decline in the fraction of college educated women who are married? Did going to college become a net-negative for women's marriage prospects just in the last 10-15 years?

The longer a student is in college — the least likely they are to get married, study says

The less likely they are to be married in the 25-34 age range. If people are unlikely to get married while in college then being in college means delaying marriage, potentially out of this age window.