this is about boring straight people not forming couples.

Funny story, I'll be going to my 30th high school reunion next year. During the festivities there will be a projector showing pictures from our time in school. My wife and I are the only couple who went to my senior prom who are still together. :-)

And yes, you are right, it's not about GLBT at all. I'm just sensitive because I've been called "the destroyer of the family" by divorcees. It's a sore spot.

GLBT is a tiny fraction of the population. If the entire community married and had kids, they'd barely dent the statistics if at all. The main effects are elsewhere. I don't get why we're obsessing over this part at all.

Like i said, just sensitive. I'll stop on that topic. But anyway, who cares if the population shrinks if automation will keep the consumer economy chugging along just fine?

I think Japan is leading the way showing us how it can be done

Even if they're being weird about it

I'm not convinced the economy will keep chugging along.

Japan is very concerned about it's birthrate and was mired in a recession for decades.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/293183044653809664/514155865834520587/image0.png

probably the driving factor is that women are financially independent to the point of being able to maintain middle-class lifestyles on their own income. since they don't have any major financial motivation for entering into a stable long-term couple, they have the luxury of being much choosier over a mate.

they also are deeply in debt and as the population shrinks, that debt becomes more dire as it becomes more concentrated.

Is that a problem, Atkins?

Men can be choosy too

from a societal collapse perspective, yes that's a problem. and no, men are not as choosy as women. OKCupid and Tinder stats demonstrate.

The women would reverse that argument, Atkins. They'd claim the men are falling behind and there's no one worth marrying anymore.

But it's very likely related.

For much of history women got given no choice in marriage. They were chattel to be sold off to the highest bidder to their fathers. I kinda don't mind this having a choice thing.

I don't think anyone's arguing that should be the case 10th.

it's not feasible for all men to be doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc, who make $150k/yr. that's always going to be a small pool of men.

Does the ability to be more choosy also typically carry over to unfaithfulness? For both sexes?

Open relationships are toxic waste

I have seen that over and over

The millenial men have fallen behind. Childless millenial women outearn millenial men something like 15% on average. They're also more educated.

Fidelity is mana to a marriage

Look at that recent vid Tim had about increasing unemployment among white millenial men. Tim's explanations are all wrong, but the numbers are fact,

Agreed, 10th. Open relationships inevitably break into a hierarchy and endless competition for attention.

I hear people saying that women don't like men who make less than them, but I know several men married to women who make more than them and both members of the couple profess to be happy.

That's a selection bias though.

Possibly

You've only found them after they were coupled.

the solution to the problem cannot be that all men must increase their income by an additional $50k/year

Agreed

I wonder if that could be a generational thing too and what other factors come into play

because that just leads to 'muh wage gap'

I know my sister complains about not finding any "suitable" men.

And she gets all sorts of suitors.

that's what i'm trying to get at. the choosiness problem.

in the past, when stable couples were the norm, forming a couple was a necessary economic arrangement. neither partner alone was capable of having a middle class lifestyle on their own.

Hyper-pickyness so picky nothing is good enough

but now that they are, there's no impetus for women to settle. they can just keep waiting for Mr. Perfect six-figures.

Let them wait. They can't biologically wait forever.