View source for Talk:Spring 2011 101 Reconstruction practice 1

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In Chuck Donovan’s article “As Marriage Fades, Society Suffers,” Donovan argues that receiving a higher education is more likely to lead to a successful marriage and that marriage leads to a more stable family life. Donovan supports the first part of his argument with five premises. First, W. Bradford Wilcox found that Americans with only a high school education were more likely to become single parents, and if married, to be far more unhappy and divorce versus married individuals with college degrees. Also, by using survey data and correlating earnings with education levels, Wilcox concludes that marriage is improving for better-off Americans and declining for those of moderate means. Wilcox also brings up the fact that by the 1990’s the divorce rate for highly educated Americans dropped from 22-19%, whereas for those with only a high school diploma, the divorce rate rose from 34 to 42%. As a fourth premise, Donovan brought up that by 2008, 44% of mothers with only a high school diploma were more likely to have a child during their marriage versus the 6% of babies of college-educated married mothers. As such, the unwed birth rate soared toward 54% for mothers who didn’t even finish high school. From this Donovan claims that better educated individuals are more likely to have a more successful marriage as well as making more rational decisions when it comes to a healthy family life (i.e. the decision to have kids).
	Donovan also argues that marriage leads to a more stable family life and he supports this with two main premises. First off, Donovan states that study after study has shown that decisions to marry reinforce male responsibility and promote work, whereas those who have a child and are unmarried don’t have this kind of environment. Donovan also mentions that married parents are able to give their children the benefits of educational attainment and personal success more so than those of a single parent.