Americans love the story of Cinderella, but if Cinderella had been born in modern America, she would probably have had to marry a beggar instead of a prince.
In the United States, the trend of "selective mating" is becoming more and more obvious. This concept refers to the tendency of people to choose a significant other with similar educational background and income level. A key premise of this trend is that the number of college-educated women is increasing. When there are equal numbers of both genders with the same level of education, it is much easier for college graduates to become attracted to each other and eventually marry.
In 2013, Susan Patton, president of Princeton University's Class of 1977, gave the following advice to current women: "Here's something no one will tell you: find a husband in school before you graduate!" Patton then went on to write in the Daily Princetonian, "You will never be surrounded by so many men who are worthy of you." Patton's comments were then met with a crusade by feminists and anti-elitists that sparked a media storm.
"Selective mating" means that family incomes will become more unequal, because education largely determines income levels. In the past, women rarely worked, and the level of education of the wife in the household had little impact on total household income. Now, a couple with a college degree has two high incomes, doubles their earning power, and the family will be in a much better financial position than a couple with a low level of education. Jeremy Greenwood and colleagues from the University of Pennsylvania estimate that "selective mating" will push the Gini coefficient (a measure of income disparity, the closer to 0 indicates that the distribution of income tends to be equal) from 0.34 to 0.43. Gary Burtless of the Brookings Institution found that 10 to 16 percent of the U.S. Gary Burtless of the Brookings Institution found that between 10 and 16 percent of the wealth gap in the United States is caused by "the increasing proximity of husbands' and wives' incomes.
Race, gender and education (age: 25-35). Source: 2008-2012 American Community Survey
Race-specific interracial marriages as a percentage of all marriages. Source: American Community Survey, 2008-2010
"Selective mating" may also have an impact on intergenerational mobility by increasing the gap in available resources between households. Families consisting of two college graduates have more money to invest in their children, can buy homes in top school districts, or send their children to high-quality private schools. These parents are also more likely to work relatively flexible hours and therefore have a better balance between work and family life. Couples or single parents with less education are more likely to work in unsafe work environments, receive lower wages, and have children who are less likely to attend quality schools.
Based on data from the 2008-2012 American Community Survey, we examine racial disparities in marriage patterns through the lens of educational attainment, focusing on college graduates in the process. Marriage rates for the non-college-educated group have fallen sharply in recent decades, with the fastest decline occurring among the black group. The gap in marriage rates between blacks and whites reflects their educational attainment gap: among blacks and whites aged 25-35, it is white women (37%) who are most likely to have at least a bachelor's degree, followed by white men (29%), black women (23%) and black men (16%). We focused on the 25-35 age group because this is the age at which most women - especially college graduates - enter their first marriage.
Racial disparities in marriage rates among college graduates (survey respondents: women aged 25-35) Source: 2012 American Community Survey
If interracial marriages become more common, two college graduates will be more likely to get married because interracial marriages will expand the pool of potential spouses, especially for minorities. The good news is that, as Bill Frey documents in his book The Diversity Explosion, the number of interracial marriages in the United States has indeed increased in recent decades, but what needs to be seen is that black Americans are still the minority least likely to interracially intermarry.
There are gender differences here, too: Frey writes that 3/4 of black-white intermarriages are a combination of black men, white women, rather than black women and white men. Marriage rates are lower for black women than for white women, even among college-educated women. 60% of black female college graduates aged 25-35 are unmarried, compared to 38% of white women. So, black female college graduates are not "selectively matched" because they are not married at all. This also helps explain why white women with a college degree are more than twice as likely to marry a man with the same or higher education than black women with the same education (29% and 13%, respectively).
If we focus on those college graduates who are married, the racial disparity is still clear: Married black female college graduates are more likely to have husbands with less education than their own than white women with similar educational backgrounds (48% and 58%, respectively).
Even though Black women have achieved social advancement through education, one of the key mechanisms for maintaining social status for their next generation - "selective mating" - has hardly helped them.
The economic benefits of "selective mating" are clear. Women who marry less educated men have lower household incomes than women who marry "up" in education, nearly $25,000 less per year. This disparity in household income status is not surprising; one of the benefits of a college education is that one is more likely to marry someone with an equivalent educational background, which usually translates into higher household income, but as we have seen, white women seem to benefit more from this than black women.
The persistent racial disparities in our society, especially the racial disparities that black Americans have to deal with, are one of the biggest challenges we need to address in the 21st century in terms of social justice. This is not just manifested as inequality at one point in time, but is also a generational issue. The problem of social mobility in the United States largely reflects the deprivation of opportunity for Black children: not only is the rate of upward mobility from the bottom of the income ladder lower, but the risk of downward mobility is also much higher. According to research, black children born into families in the middle rung of the income ladder mostly slip two notches in income levels as adults.
A complex set of factors are at play, including school quality, college access, wealth disparities, the criminal justice system and racial discrimination, but "selective mating" is also an important factor. Marriage rates in the black community are low and declining. Black women are the least likely group to "marry" across racial lines. Black men are the second least likely race and gender group to receive a college education, behind only Latino men. The combination of these factors means that college-educated black women are less likely to find a college-educated husband. The fact that they are willing to marry "down" in terms of education, rather than not at all, can be seen as good news. However, all else being equal, marrying "down" makes it more difficult for them to attain and maintain a middle-class standard of living than marrying a college-educated husband. It may also make it harder for them to help their children rise above or at least maintain their place on the income ladder.
Average annual household income of married women with at least a bachelor's degree (Survey respondents: married women ages 25-35. In U.S. dollars). Source: American Community Survey, 2008-2012
Understanding the interplay between gender, race, education and marriage helps us understand the "hereditary" nature of social status in the United States. Even though Black women have achieved social advancement through education, one of the key mechanisms for maintaining social status for the next generation - "selective mating" - has hardly helped them.
