Although we have learned that college grads have a better record of intact marriages than do non-college grads, at least in the first ten years after the wedding, we also learn that college-educated women have fewer children than average, according to the Census report. As W. Brad Wilcox points out at the Corner, “the report found that 88 percent of women without a high-school degree had a child by middle age, compared with just 76 percent of women with a college degree. On average, a woman in the former group had 2.5 births during her childbearing years, compared with 1.7 births for a woman in the latter group.”

Granted, “women without a high-school degree” may include unmarried mothers. Still, there does seem to be the suggestion that the more happily married women have fewer children; the less happily married and unmarried women have more. Even given career demands, wouldn’t you think a happy marriage would be conducive to more children? Could it be those onerous college loans? Could some degree of selfishness play a part?

A small correction or qualification to my earlier “BA Blessings” post, regarding the greater number of intact marriages among college grads. The comparison is not between marriages of college grads vs. those of high-school grads, but between college grads and those without the college degree.