People with a college education are now less likely to divorce than they were a few decades ago, and they're more likely to describe their marriages as happy. That finding really surprised me. It appears that those with a higher education have been more able to dismantle strict traditional roles and, in doing so, gain more freedom. I call it a seesaw marriage, one in which both the man and the woman take turns being the breadwinner, making it possible for each of them to experience career advancements or breaks at different times.

Blog culture has a hard time digesting narratives, but it has an easy time digesting 'big ideas' pieces.

If you look at total numbers in the working and middle class, men still on average make more than women.

We can no more create the perfect environment for our children than we can create perfect children.

That's not a convincing argument. Public sector jobs are cyclical. Teachers get fired when money is tight, then rehired when things get better. Manufacturing jobs, on the other hand, aren't coming back. They're relics of a past age.

NASA projects often have romantic names that link into a long history of exploration and adventure: Atlantis and Discovery, for example.

In China, a lot of the opening up of private entrepreneurship is happening because women are starting businesses, small businesses, faster than men.