Does Education Really Disadvantage Women in the Marriage Market?

Abstract

The last several decades have seen profound changes in the roles of women in the labor market and the family, with both the media and academic research emphasizing the conflict that women face between their roles in the two spheres. One recurring theme is the 'success penalty', or the disadvantage career success poses to women in the marriage market. In this paper I use data from the U.S. Census to track this success penalty in terms of the relationship between education and marriage for women age 40-44 over the period 1980 through 2000. In 1980, the relationship between education and marriage was essentially an inverted 'U', peaking at 12-16 years of education. When measured as the difference between the likelihood of marriage at the peak of the 'U' and the likelihood at the highest level of education, the penalty fell substantially in both the 1980's and 1990's. In each year, there are 'sheepskin effects' which appear as peaks in the 'Currently Married' profiles at high school and college completion, but there are no comparable sheepskin effects in the 'Ever Married' profiles. The relationship between education and marriage is also studied for men, by race, and allowing for cohabiting in the definition of marriage. I also track the relationship between education and motherhood; the tradeoff between these two outcomes appears to be declining as well. The decline in the disadvantaged faced by educated women in terms of family outcomes suggests that specialization and exchange is playing less of a role in marriage, and/or that the social norm for hypergamy (i.e., women 'marrying up') has shifted.