10
May 10Adult situations.
One of the great things about reading a million different blogs every day is that there’s a fair bit of serendipity (see, it’s not limited to newspapers, you ink-stained print hacks). Take 538′s analysis of education and employment prospects (it’s longish, but here’s the bit.ly version: get smart, son) and, via Kottke, a Twitter-ready thesis: “In red America, families form adults; in blue America, adults form families.”
The longer explanation after the jump:
For generations, American family life was premised on two facts. First, sex makes babies. Second, low-skilled men, if they apply themselves, can expect to get a job, make a living, and support a family.
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That is what “families form adults” means. Many teenagers and young adults formed families before they reached maturity and then came to maturity precisely by shouldering family responsibilities. Immature choices and what were once euphemistically called “accidents” were a fact of life, but the unity of sex, marriage, and procreation, combined with the pressure not to divorce, turned childish errors into adult vocations.But then along come two game-changers: the global information economy and the birth-control revolution. The postindustrial economy puts a premium on skill and cognitive ability. A high school education or less no longer offers very good prospects. Blue-collar wages fall, so a factory job no longer cuts it — if, that is, you can even find a factory job.
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New norms arise for this environment, norms geared to prevent premature family formation. The new paradigm prizes responsible childbearing and child-rearing far above the traditional linkage of sex, marriage, and procreation. Instead of emphasizing abstinence until marriage, it enjoins: Don’t form a family until after you have finished your education and are equipped for responsibility. In other words, adults form families. Family life marks the end of the transition to adulthood, not the beginning.
The whole post is very interesting, and echoes something I read a while back. I can’t find a link, but the gist was that in “red America,” getting an abortion is considered a much greater travesty than becoming a young parent, while the opposite is true in “blue America.”