‘I Do . . . for Now

AT a recent party on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, a freelance writer confided to me that she couldn’t begin to understand how today’s young women readily forego high-powered careers in banking—along with the possibility of frequent one-night stands— in order to get married and have children. I was astounded: Who says things like that anymore? This woman graduated from college the year I was born, but she might have been Wilma Flintstone for the size of the generation gap between us.

In her new book, Pamela Paul confirms that rather than having been jaded by the high divorce rate of their baby-boomer parents, or drawn to the radical-feminist overturning of the family structure, the adults of Generation X appear to be enthusiastically embracing marriage and traditional families. Piling up evidence from scientific polls as well as cheesy women’s magazines, Paul concludes that marriage among twenty-somethings is not only common, it’s chic.

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Naomi Schaefer

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AT a recent party on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, a freelance writer confided to me that she couldn’t begin to understand how today’s young women readily forego high-powered careers in banking—along with the possibility of frequent one-night stands— in order to get married and have children. I was astounded: Who says things like that anymore? This woman graduated from college the year I was born, but she might have been Wilma Flintstone for the size of the generation gap between us.

In her new book, Pamela Paul confirms that rather than having been jaded by the high divorce rate of their baby-boomer parents, or drawn to the radical-feminist overturning of the family structure, the adults of Generation X appear to be enthusiastically embracing marriage and traditional families. Piling up evidence from scientific polls as well as cheesy women’s magazines, Paul concludes that marriage among twenty-somethings is not only common, it’s chic.