x-axis manipulation and depopulation panic

In the doomsday scenario, by 2205 -- 181 years from now -- we would be back down the the global population level of the year 2000.

Child poverty: intergenerational or not, still not a mystery

Once again: How much would you pay to stop having to listen to rich people tell poor people how to run their families?* In 2023, child poverty in the United States was a $52 billion problem. Is that a lot? No, it’s not. Below, I show we can pay for it with a tax of…

Citizen Scholar goes on social media

The chapter includes general analysis and specific advice, and recounts some experiences from researchers I interviewed last year. I hope it will be relevant wherever the current platform wars land.

Chetty’s other-father mobility finding: Prove it

Do you really believe this?

Americans are having sex less often

(Why does Google call these "visually similar images" when it's obviously grouping them based on the surrounding text as well?) There are a number of sources showing a decline in sexual frequency among American adolescents and adults. Here are a few trends that I gathered as I write the update for the 4th edition of…

2022 Books in Review

The list of books we read is more personally revealing than a scattering of curated comments and status updates.

What’s the story (with the future of family demography)

Do family demography in light of disasters, inequalities, identities, and policies as messy, incoherent, unpredictable features of society – not bugs in the ointment of modern progress.

Inequality and social change, 2022 pontification edition

Perception, reality, trauma and response, inequality and social change. I talked for an hour.

Demographic facts all students should know right now

If anyone tells you that "facts are useless in an emergency," give them a bad grade.

Alexa devaluation, cutting room floor edition

Not only named after a robot, but a subservient female one.