【纽约时报 20160223】美国人结婚也讲“门当户对”

满仓

【中文标题】美国人结婚也讲“门当户对”
【原文标题】Equality in Marriages Grows, and So Does Class Divide
【登载媒体】纽约时报
【原文作者】CLAIRE CAIN MILLER、QUOCTRUNG BUI
【原文链接】http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/23/upshot/rise-in-marriages-of-equals-and-in-division-by-class.html?_r=0




从前，地球上的唐•德雷柏们（译者注：美剧《广告狂人》中的主角，有钱的公司老板）喜欢娶他们的女秘书，而现在他们会选择与自己比肩的女高管，她们赚的可能比他们还要多。

婚姻的平等性越来越普遍，美国的家庭和社会都展现出深刻的变化，因此这个国家的阶级差异越来越明显。

“正是这种夫妻间平等的理念，带来了家庭之间事与愿违的不平等现象。”威斯康星-麦迪逊大学的社会学家克里斯汀•施瓦茨说。

从灰姑娘到凯特•米德尔顿，无论是故事中还是现实中的童话都告诫女人要“借夫上位”。但是，女人说她们要去大学里获取一个“学位夫人”的名头，已经是很早以前的传统了。按照当今的文化标准——比如《实习生》中的安妮•海瑟薇和知名小说、即将上映的影片《Opening Belle》中的瑞茜•威瑟斯彭——主角都是极为成功的女性，她们的丈夫都赋闲在家。（问题预警：冲突随之而来。）


阿丽娜和马特•泰勒在他们位于加利福尼亚州奥克兰的家中。作为一名管理咨询师，她的收入比作为一家非营利组织高管的丈夫高出40％。“这根本不是什么问题。”泰勒先生说。

这样的变化主要来源于女性受教育程度的提升、更多的就业参与度、新的性别角色，以及社会学家所谓的“选型交配”理论的出现。

选型交配理论的含义是，人们倾向于与自己相似的人结合，包括相似的教育、收入、价值观和生活方式。这种现象在20世纪初比较普遍，到20世纪中叶逐渐成为主流意识形态，近年来更是迅速普及。加利福尼亚大学洛杉矶分校的社会学家罗伯特•迈尔的研究结果显示，这基本上反映了美国收入不平等现象的发展趋势。现在的人更喜欢与具有相似教育背景的人结婚——即使考虑到性别之间的差异因素，比如女性一度不大会接受高等教育。

尽管大部分丈夫的收入高于他们的妻子，但自从女性在几十年前开始大规模进入劳动力市场之后，异性夫妻之间的收入差距已经显著缩小。根据人口统计局的年度调查结果分析，今天从总体上来看，妻子的收入是丈夫收入的78％。而在1970年，这个数字是52％。

根据劳动力统计局提供的数字，在夫妻双方都有正式工作的异性婚姻中，29％的妻子收入高过丈夫，比90年代的23％和80年代的18％有显著增长。

夫妻收入的差距取决于教育、职业和所处的社会阶层。从事牙医工作的丈夫与她们的职业妻子收入差距最大，妻子的平均收入只占他们收入的47％。总体来看，从事高收入、白领工作的男性家庭中夫妻双方收入差距最大，而从事服务性行业，比如酒吧服务员、保育员等工作的男性，比他们妻子的收入要低。

这种差异与工作的性质有密不可分的关系。小时工的性别收入差距并不大，而高收入的工作往往代表工作内容没有弹性和较长的工作时间，意味着必须有人在家保障后勤，而且家庭生活可以在一个人工作较少的情况下得以维持。

夫妻收入差距的另外一个原因是，女性在整体经济中的收入低于男性，她们与男性的收入比是79:100。

这反映出不同的性别对于工作和家庭不同的依赖性。婚姻在很大程度上降低了女性的收入水平，产子所造成的效果更加严重。而男人在有了孩子之后，收入似乎水涨船高。有研究表明这是因为雇主对于母亲有工作不力的固有成见，而把父亲看作是为了养家糊口而拼命努力的形象。

婚姻的本质也在发生变化。婚姻曾经是一种社会分工：男人寻找持家主妇，女人寻找经济支柱。但是随着女性角色的变化，密歇根大学的两名经济学家比特塞•史蒂文森和贾斯汀•沃尔夫斯发现，婚姻越来越像是一种伙伴关系。现在，人们在寻找可以让他们享受与之相处，并且与自己相似的配偶。

“丈夫和妻子在不同的领域扮演不同的角色，这是对于婚姻异性相吸的观点，”沃尔夫斯先生说，“如今，你想要的是与你有共同的爱好、类似的兴趣、相同的职业目标和子女培养方向的人。”

人们寻找与自己相似的人作为配偶的另外一个原因是，他们结婚更晚，这样他们可以了解对方未来的发展，而且他们大多是在工作场合相遇。根据迈尔先生的研究，人们在50年代不大会与相似教育背景的人结婚，那时候的人结婚很早。他还发现，越来越多的美国人会基于个人喜好来建立浪漫的关系，而不受家庭和宗教等因素的制约。

美国社会在地理上逐渐两极分化，人们倾向于居住在有相似教育背景和收入水平的人群中。研究人员认为所谓的高端家庭——也就是夫妻双方都持有大学学位——越来越多，与受过高等教育的人大多居住在大城市的现象有关，因为他们约会的对象也往往是受过高等教育的人。

妻子与丈夫的收入比较。
（依丈夫所从事职业列举的收入中位数。）


技术的发展也起到了一定的作用。交友应用和婚恋网站让人们在与对方展开谈话之前就过滤掉一些潜在的对象。

这种变化也出现在世界其它国家。根据经合组织2011年提供的34个国家的数据，在所有的全职家庭中，40％的夫妇收入属于同一阶层，或者位于相邻的两个阶层，比二十年前33％的比例有所上升。三分之二的家庭成员拥有同等的教育背景。

尽管这种现象越来越普遍，但它背离了传统，而且带来了一些问题。

首先，收入更高的女人组建家庭的可能性较低。根据芝加哥大学经济学家玛瑞安•伯特兰德和埃米尔•卡曼妮卡，以及新加坡国际大学的杰西卡•潘的大数据研究结果，这个原因造成了自1970年以来结婚率下降了23％。他们采用1970年到2000年的调查数据，分析了人们在所谓的婚姻市场中的选择，也就是基于年龄、教育、种族和居住地的选择。

在这样的家庭组建之后，女性往往会寻找比自己实际能力低一些的工作，或者干脆不再工作，而且这样的婚姻更容易破裂。矛盾的是，挣钱多的妻子还会比丈夫做更多的家务，更多地照顾孩子。经济学家说，这或许是因为她们不想让丈夫感觉到压力。

明尼苏达大学的教授、婚姻关系诊疗师比尔•多尔蒂说，他曾经见到过职业成功的女人，为了弥补丈夫的感受，一手扶持丈夫的事业发展，同时自己退居幕后。

“就好像是丈夫比妻子矮，于是妻子就不穿高跟鞋了，”他说，“我们的文化基因认定，只有男人才能更大、更富有、更成功。”

一旦这些夫妻发生争吵，原因往往是性欲、家务活和照顾孩子。多尔蒂博士说，尤其是当女人对男人不再尊重，让男人感觉到自己在家庭中的地位面临危机时。

然而他和其他研究人员认为，这种情况也在发生变化，因为年轻人更崇尚婚姻和社会分工平等的理念。

28岁的阿丽娜•泰勒是一名管理咨询师，她的收入比作为一家非营利组织高管的丈夫高出40％。“这根本不是什么问题。”泰勒先生说。

他们说自己知道，有了孩子之后有可能在家庭分工问题上产生冲突，比如她经常出差，而他的工作时间比较灵活。“因为我的收入比他高很多，总有一天我们要找到解决办法。”她说。

研究人员说，选型交配的增长与收入分配不平等现象密切相关。威斯康星大学的社会学家施瓦茨博士说，两者呈第次上升的关系，“有机会结婚的人往往占据了一定的优势，有优势的人还要寻找与他们具备类似优势的人结婚，他们的优势就翻倍了。”

这会给未来几代人造成深远的影响。有研究表明，父母的收入和教育水平对于子女的发展机会和成就有巨大的影响。而今天的孩子更多地成长在一个父母极为相似、缺少差异的家庭中。






原文：

The Don Drapers of the world used to marry their secretaries. Now they marry fellow executives, who could very well earn more than they do.

With more marriages of equals, reflecting deep changes in American families and society at large, the country is becoming more segregated by class.

“It’s this notion of this growing equality between husbands and wives having this paradoxical effect of growing inequality across households,” said Christine Schwartz, a sociologist who studies the topic at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

From Cinderella to Kate Middleton, fictional and real-life fairy tales have told of women marrying up. But it has been a long time since women said they went to college to earn a “Mrs. degree.” In more recent cultural touchstones — like “The Intern,” with Anne Hathaway, and “Opening Belle,” the novel and soon-to-be Reese Witherspoon movie — the protagonists are highly successful women with husbands who don’t work. (Spoiler alert: Conflict ensues.)

Alena and Matt Taylor at home in Oakland, Calif. A management consultant, she earns 40 percent more than her husband, a nonprofit executive. “It has felt like a nonissue,” Mr. Taylor said. Credit Jason Henry for The New York Times

These changes have been driven by women’s increasing education and labor force participation, new gender roles, and the rise of what social scientists call assortative mating.

Assortative mating is the idea that people marry people like themselves, with similar education and earnings potential and the values and lifestyle that come with them. It was common in the early 20th century, dipped in the middle of the century and has sharply risen in recent years — a pattern that roughly mirrors income inequality in the United States, according to research by Robert Mare, a sociologist at the University of California, Los Angeles. People are now more likely to marry people with similar educational attainment — even after controlling for differences between men and women, like the fact that women were once less likely to attend college.

Even though the typical husband still makes more than his wife, the marital pay gap among opposite-sex couples has shrunk significantly in the decades since women started entering the work force en masse. Today, wives over all make 78 percent of what their husbands make, according to an Upshot analysis of annual survey data from the Census Bureau. That’s up from 52 percent in 1970.

In opposite-sex marriages in which both spouses work some amount of time, 29 percent of wives earn more than their husbands do, up from 23 percent in the 1990s and 18 percent in the 1980s, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The marriage pay gap varies by education, profession and class. Husbands who are dentists have the greatest pay difference with their working wives, who earn 47 cents for every dollar their husbands earn. Generally, couples in which men have high-earning, white-collar jobs have the largest marital pay gap, while men in service jobs like bartending and child care earn less than their wives.

These differences have to do with the nature of the jobs. Hourly workers have a smaller gender pay gap in general. High-paying jobs generally have the least flexibility and the longest hours — which means someone has to pick up the slack at home, and families can afford for one spouse to work less.

The marital pay gap still exists in part because women earn less than men in the economy as a whole, making 79 cents for a man’s dollar.

It reflects the stickiness of gender roles at work and at home: Marriage significantly depresses women’s earnings, and the arrival of children has an even stronger effect. Men, meanwhile, tend to earn more after having children, and studies show that’s because employers see mothers as less committed to work and fathers as doubly committed to breadwinning.

The nature of marriage itself is changing. It used to be about the division of labor: Men sought homemakers, and women sought breadwinners. But as women’s roles changed, marriage became more about companionship, according to research by two University of Michigan economists, Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers (who also contributes to The Upshot). Now, people marry others they enjoy spending time with, and that tends to be people like themselves.

“Husbands and wives had different roles in different spheres, so that was the opposites-attract view of marriage,” Mr. Wolfers said. “Today you want people with shared passions, similar interests to you, similar career goals, similar goals for the kids.”

Another reason people are finding mates like themselves is that they are marrying later, so they know more about their partners’ prospects and increasingly meet at work. People were least likely to marry those with similar educational backgrounds around the 1950s, according to Mr. Mare’s research, when people married very young. Americans are increasingly able to make their own romantic choices based on personal preferences, free from family or religious expectations, he found.

American society has also become more segregated geographically; people tend to live near others with similar educations and earnings. Researchers have linked the increase in so-called power couples, in which both partners have a college degree, to the fact that educated people are more likely now to live in big cities — so the people they date tend to be educated, too.

How much more (or less) do wives make than their husbands?

Median pay ratio, by husband's occupation

For men and women age 25-54. The marriage pay gap compares earnings of couples where both husband and wife are both working full-time. Analysis compiled using the American Community Survey from ipums.org at the University of Minnesota Population Center.

Technology could also play a role: Dating apps and sites let people filter their potential partners before they even have a conversation.

The change is happening internationally, too. In 40 percent of couples in which both partners work, they belong to the same or neighboring income bracket, up from 33 percent two decades ago, according to 2011 data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which includes 34 countries. Two-thirds have the same level of education.

Despite being more common, these marriages are a break from tradition, and that can present problems.

Marriages in which the woman earns more are less likely to form in the first place, which accounts for 23 percent of the overall decline in marriage rates since 1970, according to a large study by the economists Marianne Bertrand and Emir Kamenica of the University of Chicago and Jessica Pan of the National University of Singapore. Using census data from 1970 to 2000, they analyzed the choices people made in so-called marriage markets, based on age, education, race and where they lived.

When such marriages do form, the women become more likely to seek jobs beneath their potential or to stop working entirely, and the marriages are more likely to end in divorce. Paradoxically, wives who earn more also do significantly more housework and child care than their husbands do, perhaps to make their husbands feel less threatened, the economists said.

Bill Doherty, a marriage therapist and professor at the University of Minnesota, said he had seen women who were more professionally successful than their husbands compensate by building up their husbands’ careers and playing down their own.

“It’s kind of like if he’s shorter than she is, she doesn’t wear heels,” he said. “It’s in the cultural DNA that if anyone should be bigger, richer, more successful, it should be the man.”

When these couples struggle, it is often over issues like sexual desire or the division of housework and child care, Dr. Doherty said, particularly if the woman loses respect for the man and the man feels insecure about his role in the family.

Yet that dynamic seems to be changing, he and other researchers said, because young people have more egalitarian views about marriage and the division of labor.

Alena Taylor, 28, a management consultant, earns 40 percent more than her husband, Matt, 31, a nonprofit executive. “It has felt like a nonissue,” Mr. Taylor said.

They said they knew that conflict could arise over their division of labor when they have children, including because she travels more and he has greater flexibility. “Because my earnings potential is much higher than his, over time we’ll have to figure that out,” she said.

Researchers say the rise in assortative mating is closely linked to income inequality. The two have increased in tandem, Dr. Schwartz, the sociologist from the University of Wisconsin, said: “People who are married tend to be more advantaged, and on top of that, more advantaged people are marrying people like themselves, so those people tend to be doubly advantaged.”

The effects could become more pronounced in future generations. Studies tell us that parents’ income and education have an enormous effect on children’s opportunities and achievements — and children today are more likely to grow up in homes in which parents are more similar than different.