Why you’ll never establish the existence of distinct “generations” in American society

We're not going to find a set of fixed divisions that works across arenas -- such as social attitudes, family behavior, and economic status.

Very important social scientist says — wait, Brad Wilcox did what now?

The best news you'll read all day.

The continuation of babies

There is no guarantee that a happy, healthy, equal, and harmonious population wants to produce enough children to maintain or grow its total size.

Wilcox and colleagues plagiarized my work in the New York Times

You could split hairs, but why?

Sibship size and educational attainment update

I just read this Demography paper by Benjamin G. Gibbs, Joseph Workman, and Douglas B. Downey for my work on the new edition of The Family (don't hold your breath, but I'm working on it). It seeks to modify the traditional "resource dilution" model of explaining why children with more siblings end up with lower educational attainment,…

Fertility rate implications explained

There is no reason for US population decline, with even moderate levels of immigration. Immigration rates do not have to increase to maintain the current population.

Do rich people like bad data tweets about poor people? (Bins, slopes, and graphs edition)

How a Brad Wilcox tweet taught me nothing at all, but inspired me to write this post.

The happiness scamcession

Eight pretty happy men in the General Social Survey changed the course of history.

Equal-education and wife-more-education married couples don’t have sex less often

Something I never got around to checking in the General Social Survey before.

New findings: The widening political divide over science

Political conservatives, Republicans, and Americans who attend religious services regularly, all report falling levels of confidence in the scientific community.