Career vs Marriage: New Research for Black Women

Conventional wisdom, movies, and personal experience in our society lead many to believe that our educated, career-minded Black women will eventually face a decision: Get Mine or Get a Man?

According to new research, the decision to ‘settle’ may hold more myth than fact.

Economists Betsey Stevenson and Adam Isen, prepared the briefing paper for the Council on Contemporary Families. The two’s findings are based on data collected from 1950 to 2008 about women and marriage trends.

A few highlights include:

• Contrary to Conventional Wisdom, African-American women do not face a “marriage penalty” when they acquire higher education. In fact, black women who have graduated from college or completed some college are more likely to marry than less-educated groups of black women.
• College-educated women are more likely than any other group of women to report themselves happy in their marriage, whatever the level of their family income, and they are much less likely to think that “financial security is the main benefit of marriage.

You can find the full version of the paper here. Hustletown readers, do you believe the so-called marriage penalty is real? Please share your thoughts with us below!