In USA, high status men have more offspring than low status men (reverse among women)

Well, this is interesting, even though it is a generation old. I wonder if there is current data somewhere?

in USA, high status men have more offspring than low status men (reverse found among women) pic.twitter.com/MjicW18f7z

— David Schmitt (@PsychoSchmitt) September 12, 2016

I have seen not dissimilar graphs for class but I don't believe I have ever seen one by gender.

How to interpret? Not much of a clue beyond its face value. In many ways this mirrors ancient social tropes. I wonder to what degree and in which direction this might have changed in the intervening 22 years? I wonder what the graphs look like by group cultural origin? How does this tie into Gregory Clark's work where he documents upper class higher offspring survival as a mechanism for disseminating high class culture into lower classes? So many questions.

And what is going on with the women element of the data? Upper class women having fewer children is a disapproved reality going back to Caesar Augustus complaining and trying to come up with a solution to get upper class women to have more children.

Economically it is entirely consistent with theory. Childbearing has significant career and monetary costs to the mother, IF she has high human capital (education, opportunities, status, etc.) A highly educated woman with a well-launched career gives up a lot financially in order to have children, regardless of how supportive might be her husband and company. Anything that costs more is consumed less. In terms of opportunity cost, children have a higher cost to upper class women, therefore they have, all other things being equal, fewer children.

Lower class women, potentially having lower human capital (status, opportunities and education) suffer less opportunity cost and indeed, from a life cycle insurance perspective, might be net beneficiaries of having children. Something that has a lower cost (and higher benefit) is consumed more.

So economic theory is consistent with the observed data.

But what about biological (evolutionary) theory? In what evolutionary scenario does it make sense that nominally (recognizing that all human life has equal inherent value) better off females should reproduce less? I guess, that is the part of the equation that makes least sense to me from a thinking perspective. Reminds me of that Idiocracy trailer.


Click to see full screen.

UPDATE: High Status Men (But Not Women) Capture the Eye of the Beholder from 2008.

UPDATE: The more I think about this, this is really just a data based visualization that is, perhaps, a corollary to the theory of hypergamy. I am still left with the question: hypergamy, assortative mating, and differential fertility by gender and class - what is the net impact of these somewhat divergent (and in tension) theories and realities?