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Dating, education, and sex ratios

robkhenderson.com

111–120 of 446 posts

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#111

This is a known issue but the down stream effect won’t be felt for a while. Let’s be clear we’re talking about general behavioral trend, not trying to police an individual, which is the crux of contention for these topics. Many women still hold on to the idea of finding a partner that is wealthier and more educated. This is due to the past (over)reliance of their partners for stability. But this is no longer true. Th…

> The education gap between men and women are growing. More women enroll and graduate from college then men. Many young men, mostly lower-middle class, (whether fairly or not) feel like the education system does not work for them. So, like, isn't the question "why"? Why do boys, particularly lower- or lower-middle class, not believe in the education system as much as their sisters? School sucks, work sucks, then you…

A possible explanation is that most teachers in primary school are female, which creates an environment and behavioral expectations that favor girls, e.g.:

- Teachers and the Gender Gaps in Student Achievement - https://jhr.uwpress.org/content/XLII/3/528

- Gender differences in teachers’ perceptions of students’ temperament, educational competence, and teachability - https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-8279.2010.02017.x

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#112

Im not sure given the information from (my non - American) environment. 1.) I sometimes talk with young woman about this topic. A few mentioned who are ambitious and do wish having kids start to think about getting a house man as a father. Also when I mentioned this studies some women complain that man prefer women with lower earnings... We know that prestige, earning much etc. is a big thing in US. These observation…

Also incels movement are a thing and they cant be explained with the given text.

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think definitions of "a finished person" are being mismatched here. in my experience most people just want a partner that is a functional adult. Knows how to eat properly. Understands taxes. Can speak intelligently about cost of living topics like budgeting groceries and entertainment. Can drink moderately on a weeknight knowing they have to go to work the next day. Edited to add: In my experience, if you don't dat…

Yeah, and all of that sounds totally reasonable until you have a working knowledge of lots of interactions between tons of real people you've actually spoken with and had connections with to learn how life actually works. Your requirements per a "functional adult" are an example of people asking for too much because they have no practical understanding of reality: Americans don't eat properly . The average American i…

I wouldn't consider weight to be a good indicator of capacity to make meals. I know thin people who I wouldn't trust to make me a cup of water and I know fat people who can adhere to a strict diet for their children.

I also wouldn't consider CPI-W and CPI-U to be cost-of-living concerns. I consider being able to say "hey, honey, we can't spend 500$ on your mobile game because eggs cost 7 for a dozen at the grocery store this week, we need to revise our budget" to be adult behavior.

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#114

Conversations about high income as a factor in attracting women often seem to neglect to mention that it's not enough to have a high income if you don't use it to signal wealth or to provide luxury experiences to women. Telling women you want to put your high income to work in enabling you to retire early but live a modest life and use that freedom to pursue creative pursuits doesn't have the same effect as taking th…

Absolutely. You have to flex or be willing to “spoil” in some manner/degree.

Edit: Or, most great products still need to advertise.

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stuff like this is actually researched. It would be better to first look at the research before comparing anecdotal hypotheses. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/11/08/whats-beh... > Men are more likely than women to point to factors that have more to do with personal choice. Roughly a third (34%) of men without a bachelor’s degree say a major reason they didn’t complete college is that they just didn’t wa…

Well, maybe the reason why those men didn't want to complete college is because they don't have the same support that women do (or at least, that's what they percieve).

In part, lack of support (other than financial) is a reason it took me so long to complete college. But anecdata can't be relied on for population studies. These questions need to be asked, sure.

Based on the chart in the St. Louis Fed link, in the US women have outnumbered men since 1980 (shortly after the Vietnam draft ended). While the ratio has been increasing the only real visually noticeable upticks in the data were around 1993 for 4+ year colleges and 2001 for 2-year colleges. I wonder if some men who might have gone to a 2-year school instead enlisted following 9/11.

I don't think there was any particular STEM support for women in 1980 and into the early 1990s, at least. But maybe something did happen in 1993 (and possibly something additional to 9/11 in 2001). Are these additional women going into STEM majors?

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#116

I mean the research is nice, but I don't think that just a degree is going to up your chances. As someone who is using these apps constantly, I don't have any hope of finding a long term partner on there. I am on pretty much every app, except Tinder (Bumble, Hinge, okcupid, pof and even muzmatch (im south asian)). I have a bachelors, and I make good money. I've been told that I am a decent looking guy and I have quit…

I'm getting married next month, a relationship started from a date found in possibly the worst of all the apps (Match, if you can believe it).

I dated for a lot of years and, despite having some positives outlined by this article, I was also divorced and have a son. That made it massively more difficult to find a long term match given that many women flatly reject that combo.

I learned though to be upfront. About your life. About what you're looking for. You're not looking for 95% of women to be attracted to you! You're looking for one. It sounds like you're optimizing the search already, so don't waste time worrying about 95%. People always say be yourself and I didn't appreciate what that meant until I started taking control of my dating journey.

For example, I stopped tailoring dates around what they wanted to do. I planned stuff that I wanted to do and if somebody I was talking to wanted to come along, awesome. If not, I did it anyhow. I stopped hiding my love for Country music and went anyhow. My wife loves Country. :)

Also, if you're honest in your profile and somebody wants to start casual.. consider it. People have a hard time in the dating scene and you can't fault them for not wanting to invest 100% right away. Have confidence in yourself and know the right one will stick around no matter what they said in the beginning. And if they don't, that's cool too. Hopefully you have some fun dates and life experience to make you a better date when the right one does show up. It does take practice.

Much of a long term relationship starts when two people are at the right points in their lives. You can't really plan it, it just happens when it does and that's why people say they feel lucky. Much of it is luck. Leave space for that to happen too!

Good luck to you.

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#117
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What’s the average age of people in your social group? I’m guessing over 35. It’s a very different story if you try talking to people in their 20’s or younger.

We're "millenial-ish" (in that, we're all between 25 to 40yrs old). I myself am not over 35 just yet. > It’s a very different story if you try talking to people in their 20’s or younger. Is it? We're old enough that half of us have kids, and some of us have teenaged kids (13-19yrs old), and they also have friends and such. It doesn't seem that different to me. (They're less willing to tolerate arbitrary BS, but other…

Teenagers who haven’t gone to college yet won’t be that different. When they move out and live among peers and take courses from professors with views very different from home, you’ll see how things change!

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#119

To speak frankly, what are women doing with all this supposed surplus of education? I don't exactly see turning tides in terms of women beginning to dominate markets or leadership positions because they're starting businesses and startups and taking over boards and middle management positions. Anecdotally, I've seen these single women, they're all waiting until they're past their 20s to find a partner and they expect…

> To speak frankly, what are women doing with all this supposed surplus of education?

What's funny is that I talked about Bourdieu a whole afternoon during last week's strike, and today, two conversations where my 10 year old knowledge could be used.

Women historically had low economic, symbolic and social capital, but could have high cultural one. They used this cultural capital to gain the others.

But Bourdieu explain that capital structure is a chiasma, and that people with high economic capital will push to get their offspring to get cultural capital (or at least symbols, aka diploma), and people with high cultural capital will try to prevent it by creating other symbols (that was in the 70s, he basically predicted diploma inflation 40 years before it happened). In the meantime, people with high cultural capital will try to get high economic capital, and people with high economic capital will try to prevent that (basically having too much culture/knowledge is an hindrance to truly get on the highest march)

And I realized I don't understand him well enough to correctly explain his theories, so I scraped my explanations and left the basic, you should read him, but basically, it's inconsious phenomenon that isn't really caused by inconsious sexism (it might but I don't think so) but by capital structure.

Re: Dating, education, and sex ratios

#120
post #33

To speak frankly, what are women doing with all this supposed surplus of education? I don't exactly see turning tides in terms of women beginning to dominate markets or leadership positions because they're starting businesses and startups and taking over boards and middle management positions. Anecdotally, I've seen these single women, they're all waiting until they're past their 20s to find a partner and they expect…

They are outcompeting men in their premarriage years; in the most significant metros, single women's income matches or exceeds single men's. And as of 2016 40% of managers are female. I agree that women tend to not be going for the riskiest jobs or those that require significant tradeoffs in work-life balance; for those, you need a supportive spouse, and there are both demand- and supply-side issues in pairings where…

> I agree that women tend to not be going for the riskiest jobs or those that require significant tradeoffs in work-life balance; for those, you need a supportive spouse, and there are both demand- and supply-side issues in pairings where males play the supportive role to a female primary earner.

Choosing more risky jobs may be male biology and the gender equality paradox.

No increase in supply of supportive husbands would significantly increase the amount of women choosing riskier careers.

> Iceland consistently ranks as the most gender-equal nation. It is also the nation where men and women are most likely to pursue sex-typical jobs.[1]

Also does a person truly need a supportive spouse to undertake a risky career? My assumption is that people decide their career paths well before marriage, and some men choose their career to be a more attractive dating prospect.

[1] https://bigthink.com/the-present/gender-equality-paradox/

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