From my piece today:

Welcome to the curious appeal of the Bachelor and Bachelorette series: In an era when marriage rates are declining, Americans are fascinated by a show that is unabashedly about finding a lifelong spouse. And these long-running reality series are not the only example of this phenomenon: How I Met Your Mother, a series about a man telling his children about his long search to meet their mother, is about to begin its ninth season.
But if the statistics are any indication, more Americans are like How I Met Your Mother’s Ted Mosby, who has spent eight years pining for a spouse without finding Miss Right, than like Sean Lowe, the most recent Bachelor, who is happily engaged. Americans are getting married later than ever: According to a 2011 Pew Research Center study, the average age is 27 for women and 29 for men.
And overall, marriage rates are declining. That same Pew study shows that 51 percent of adults are married, down from 72 percent in 1960. Bowling Green State University’s National Center for Family and Marriage Research declared last month that the “marriage rate [is at its] lowest in a century,” at 31.1 marriages for every 1,000 unmarried women.

Read the rest here.