But again — who cares? This isn’t some sort of crisis. The surveys you found only confirm that there are people out there that aren’t married and in their 30’s, and some who really do want to be married, and maybe even some who want kids. But I still don’t see the hard evidence to support the “Fact: There is an increas­ing trend of sin­gle, child­less women in thir­ties who do not want to be sin­gle and childless.”

Single childless women who want to be married and have kids have always existed. Now, perhaps the demographics of this set of women has changed and it is now including smart, intelligent, attractive women that have jobs who 50 years ago might have been swept up by some guy early on and made into a housewife. Maybe more traditionally less desireable women are making it into marriage instead to replace those putting it off. In the past they may have been lonely and childless in their 30s.

Anyway, I am getting tired of this discussion. It seems as though you claimed something to be a fact before you actually had any data to support it, and only came up with some loosely related surveys and studies to support that “fact” after being asked about it. I could probably google up a dozen studies to support all sorts of facts if I really wanted to.

I would much rather discuss this sort of thing when it is correctly presented as a perception, or opinion of some sort. Even a few anecdotes of some sort to start the discussion instead of forcing things to be facts that really aren’t.

1) you still haven’t shown any statistics. That is, real statistics from real sources. Random surveys conducted by liberal British newspapers aren’t going to do it.

2) the very few “statistics” you present can be taken any number of ways, most of which are not the spin you and your beloved authors cite.

3) you’re arguing from what seems to be an ideological standpoint, as indiscernible as it might be to the rest of us.

4) I don’t care enough; I think you’re wrong; Dan & Mike have already expended far more energy on contradicting you than I have; and, I think that the more you defend your position, the deeper the hole you’re digging, which might just hurt you in your quest for the perfect wife.

“Thus terrible tiredness took so many women to doctors in the 1950’s that one decided to investigate it. He found, surprisingly, that his patients suffering from “housewife’s fatigue’ slept more than an adult needed to sleep –as much as ten hours a day– and that the actual energy they expended on housework did not tax their capacity. The real problem must be something else, he decided-perhaps boredom. Some doctors told their women patients they must get out of the house for a day, treat themselves to a movie in town. Others prescribed tranquilizers. Many suburban housewives were taking tranquilizers like cough drops. You wake up in the morning, and you feel as if there’s no point in going on another day like this. So you take a tranquilizer because it makes you not care so much that it’s pointless.”

So who is to say that being 40, single, and wanting a baby is worse than what some felt in the 1950s married?

Because more women today have the option of choosing a career first than ever before. This additional option has led this group of women to plan their lives poorly. For that, they are unhappy.

I would apply the reverse question here as well. Back in, say, the 1950’s, when it was expected that men would work full-time and women would run the household full-time, how many women were homemakers that did not want to be? They were forced into staying home, and were therefore unhappy. At least the women of today have the FREEDOM to choose what they want to do. If they choose poorly, that’s their fault for doing so.

Before, many women were miserable because they had no other options. Today, many women are miserable because they selected the wrong option. This is still progress, because there is greater freedom than ever before.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/3657264/The-rise-and-rise-of-the-single-woman.…html

What is clear though is that women are waiting longer before they make that step. In the early Seventies, 85 per cent of women were married by the time they were 30, now, fewer that one woman in three is married by that age.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMfEDTXUnbQ

Documentary film about single women no longer waiting for mr. right to have a baby. The trend is ballooning among women in their mid thirties to mid forties.

http://love.ivillage.com/snd/sndcouplehood/0„7rvj7n9q-p,00.html

The population bubble of single women from their mid-thirties through their early fifties is one major factor propelling the rekindled-love phenomenon [of reuniting with past loves]. I have at least a dozen girlfriends who would be fantastic catches for the right guy, but these women are still waiting. They have tried blind dates, singles events, setups by friends, wine-tasting classes, flash dating, bowling leagues, golf lessons and church mixers. They have dating fatigue ‑- they are weary of continually starting over, trying to impress new people, looking for love. They’re ready to find it.

This group includes women who have put their personal lives on hold to work full blast at a career. Some have had a long relationship or two ‑- even one they thought would lead to marriage, until it didn’t. Others married Mr. Wrong and ended up divorced. These terrific women want to settle down, but they can’t find partners.

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/why-are-we-single-finding-a-new-partner-can-be-much-harder-for-a-woman-than-a-man-linda-grant-reports-1509849.html

The statistics are pretty brutal. Although there are more single (divorced, widowed or never married) men than single women (of all ages apart from the late forties), there are more women than men overall, a gap which increases in the older age groups. The older women get, the less are their chances of remarrying. As long as Andrew continues to look for women younger than himself, he will find plenty of potential partners, for there are more available women in their twenties, than there are unattached men in their thirties.

If Paula continues to insist on an older man she may look in vain. According to the 1991 census, there were 390,000 unattached women aged 40 to 44 in Britain and only 228,000 men between 45 and 49 (in part because there were fewer births during the war). A 40-year-old man who wants a girlfriend between 30 and 34 will have a pool of 573,000 available women. A 40-year-old woman trying to find a partner between 45 and 49 will only have 228,000 men to drawn on.

http://nymag.com/nymetro/nightlife/singles/features/2394/#ixzz0dqkXFQDt

Women in their thirties have cooled on the dating scene. Thirty-three percent are not currently dating, and 29 percent don’t want to get married. One in five hasn’t had sex in over a year. One in ten women respondents in their thirties claimed to be panic-stricken about their prospects, compared with 3 percent of men in their thirties…

The dropout rate goes up with age: 33 percent of women respondents in their thirties said they’re not dating, and 9 percent admitted to panicking.

If you, Jen, Mike, or Jeff would want to write a lengthy, point-by-point response to my essay incorporating all my ideas, I’d feature it in its own post. Balanced reporting, and all.

http://www.samueljscott.com/2007/10/05/the-battle-of-the-sexes/

Wrong. The human race is dependent upon MEN AND WOMEN having and raising good sons and daughters. The duty of parenthood is equally applied to both men and women, and the men who see it as a woman’s responsibility are selfish, vile creatures. Why is it solely a woman’s responsibility? That’s shirking one’s duty as a man to not step up and help out with raising your children.

“The world does not need more CEOs and cubicle-dwellers; the world needs more good moth­ers. It is the most impor­tant job a woman will ever have.”

Wrong again! The world needs more good MOTHERS AND FATHERS. It is the most important job a WOMAN AND A MAN will ever have. The most important duty of a generation is to leave the world a better place for their children. This requires the full participation and accepting of responsibility of men and women in raising their children.

“When I lived in Boston, a bunch of my Israeli friends there worked as nan­nies. The fam­i­lies con­sisted of a father who worked all the time and a mother who wanted to be a “career woman.” Guess who raised the chil­dren? The nan­nies. That’s horrible.”

I agree. I think I have made it clear that parenting is just about the most important job in the world. As long as you are willing to accept the fact that it is the failure of the father as well as the mother in leaving their children to be raised by nannies, I will agree with this point.

#1 pretty clearly states that there is a number of women that want to be single, but not childless, and have found a way to achieve that.

#2 talks about single men

#3 is a survey on the sex lives of New Yorkers

#4 talks about Japan, which is pretty far East and has some very odd demographic issues in general. Nothing is mentioned about women who want to be married and have kids. It is a jump to make that claim based on a statistic about people getting married at an older age than a few years ago.

#5 China? I guess it is the closest thing to supporting your theory, but China?

For something that has been presented as such a concrete fact, I would have expected more applicable stories. I guess I am still thinking this is more a perception.