Why Americans Aren't Getting Married and Having Kids—and How to Change That  

The U.S. fertility rate has been falling quickly in the last decade or so, down from a replacement level of 2.1 children per women to just 1.6 today. Like many developed countries, we too face a demographic crisis. It is encouraging to see that the new administration is paying attention to the issue and gathering ideas to help Americans have more babies.

But to address the issue more effectively, we must first understand the biggest hurdle for Americans who desire children but aren’t having them: it’s not money or careers but finding the right person to have children with.

For Americans who desire a family, money matters, but it pales in comparison to the challenge of finding the right partner. When asked about reasons why they are not having the number of children they desire in an earlier IFS/Wheatley Institute survey, 44% of Americans adults ages 55 and younger pointed to the fact that they are still looking for the right spouse or partner, and 36% cited financial reasons. 

At the same time, across social and economic backgrounds, the top reason single Americans gave for remaining single was not money, jobs, or even readiness for commitment, but that “it is hard to find the right person to marry.”

It is important to note that there is no lack of desire for marriage and children in America. Poll after poll shows that these aspirations remain strong. A recent Institute for Family Studies/YouGov survey found that the vast majority (93%) of young adults under age 35 are either married or open to marriage, while only 7% are unmarried and do not want to marry. Similarly, just 14% of young adults say they don’t want to have children, while the remaining 86% either already have children or are open to becoming parents. 

These survey results mirror what I see in real life. When I visit college campuses and speak about marriage and family, the most frequently asked question, from both students and concerned parents, is almost always: How to find the right person to marry?  

Marriage and family are deeply personal issues. Whie the challenges of finding the right person may vary from individual to individual, our broader dating and marriage culture has an enormous influence on our personal lives. Today, popular dating norms, such as delaying marriage until 30s, holding out for a “perfect” soulmate, and maximizing potential partners through dating apps and online platforms, often work against the very goals of marriage and family that so many young adults aspire to.  

To address the biggest factor behind the decline of marriage and family and help young adults realize their personal goals, we need a cultural shift that reshapes individual beliefs and offers alternatives to today’s prevailing norms around dating and marriage. 

The Unique Advantage of Cornerstone Marriage for Modern Women

There are two ways to think about marriage. One is the capstone model, where marriage is the last piece to complete a successful life. You get your ducks in a row—education, some professional success, and a clear adult identity—before marriage. As Kay Hymowitz and colleagues wrote in a report over a decade ago, “for many college-educated Americans, marriage is now seen as a capstone rather than a cornerstone—a status symbol that signals they have arrived.” This mindset prioritizes individual development and accomplishments before committing to marriage. It’s one main reason marriage has been delayed in recent decades. In 1960, American women typically married at age 20, but today this age is approaching 30.    

The other approach to marriage is the cornerstone model, the one many of our parents and grandparents followed. This view sees marriage as a foundation to start with, where two people commit to each other, support each other, and grow together as they build a life. This cornerstone mindset may seem old fashioned, but it has a unique advantage in today’s society, especially for single women who want to get married and have a family. 

From Jane Austin’s Pride and Prejudice to modern day single women navigating the dating apps, “marrying up” has long been the gold standard for single women seeking a spouse. Even though young women today have outpaced men in earning college degrees and are more likely to “marry down” educationally, they still tend to marry a higher earning spouse or someone from a higher status family, which reinforces this long-standing pattern.

However, this “marrying up” model has narrowed young women’s options, as a growing share of men are either not employed or not doing as well financially compared to women. Moreover, as singles age, their likelihood of marrying drops dramatically. 

The advantage of a cornerstone model is that a young person begins marriage before achieving full status, so there is no “up” or “down” in terms of earnings or social status when looking for a spouse. More importantly, this approach focuses more on the inner qualities of a potential spouse and therefore may even have a higher chance of a successful marriage. 

“We knew each other in college, and it felt right,” British journalist Louise Perry recently told me about her marriage after we finished an event at the University of Virginia. “Neither of us were making money at the time, and there was no point in marrying up or down.” Over the years, Louise and husband took turns being the primary breadwinner of the family. The couple has two children, and their marriage is going strong.  

A cornerstone approach offers many benefits. Most importantly, it does not involve traveling alone on life’s journey. Instead of working hard on one’s own to achieve what is needed to get married and have a family, two people build a life together and pursue their life goals as a team.

Remember, marriage is not a destination, but the start of a new chapter.

The Soulmate Myth is Overrated 

From Cinderella to Shrek, Hollywood has perfected the idea of a soulmate and the notion of “one true love.” The idea of a soulmate is indeed popular. According to a 2021 YouGov poll of nearly 15,000 U.S. adults, 60% believe in the idea of soulmates. Women are more likely than men to believe their soulmate is out there (64% vs. 55%). An earlier poll from YouGov found that 60% of Americans believe it is better to hold out for a soulmate rather than settle for someone less than ideal.

Unfortunately, the soulmate idea is just not realistic. Scientist and professor Bill Sullivan and his wife met and fell in ‘love at first sight,’ but, as he wrote in a piece for Psychology Today, their story is far from a fairy tale. “The movies make us feel entitled to perfection delivered to our doorstep by fate, but this is not how things work in the real world,” he explained. The key ingredient to their success was that they both put the effort to nurture their relationship. In his words, “If you want to cultivate a satisfying relationship, you need to be a constant gardener.”

The soulmate idea is not only unrealistic but can also discourage people from putting in the effort to build a strong relationship. They go into the relationship expecting minimum effort. After all, if this person is a perfect match, a soulmate, the relationship should be smooth sailing and easy, right? But this is far from reality, as the bestselling author Neil Strauss said in his book: 

Perhaps the biggest mistake I made in the past was that I believed love was about finding the right person. In reality, love is about becoming the right person. Don’t look for the person you want to spend your life with. Become the person you want to spend your life with.

Moreover, a soulmate model can actually harm our relationships. In Get Married, sociologist Brad Wilcox shows that couples who embrace the “soulmate” model have less faith that their marriage will last, compared with couples who believe that marriage is about romance but also kids, money, and raising a family together, which he calls “family first.” Similarly, psychologists have shown that couples who believe in soulmates are more likely to struggle with conflict than those who view their time together as a journey to grow together.

Love is a choice, not just a feeling. Commitment and the willingness to work on the relationship are required, even for the few lucky ones who believe they have found a soulmate. 

Running Clubs Are the New Dating Apps

Despite the declining popularity of dating apps among Gen-Zs, online platforms remain one of the most common ways for young couples to meet their future spouse or partner, with 30% meeting online. This makes sense in our increasingly digitized world, where technology helps in many areas of our lives.

However, research suggests that meeting online is not necessarily the best place to find a future spouse. Comparing different places that couples met, an earlier Institute for Family Studies survey shows that married young adults ages 18 to 35 who met their partner in person (whether at church, religious gatherings, parties, or school) are much happier with their marriage, compared with couples who met online. Of course, there are exceptions: young couples who met their spouse in bars or restaurants reported being the least happy.

Couples who met online also have higher divorce rates than those who met through family, friends, or a neighbor, according to a UK study. And similar findings applies to the U.S.  as well. This is likely because couples who met online often marry as “relative strangers,” having to build their social network from scratch, compared with those who met through established family and friend networks.

Another drawback of online dating is its link to delayed or foregone marriage and childbearing. The culture surrounding these platforms does not encourage marriage, since it is not in the financial interest of dating apps for users to settle down. As Jon Birger wrote in his book on dating, “Tinder, Match, and OkCupid do not want to get you off the market. They want to transform you into lifelong shoppers.” 

For users of online dating apps, having a larger pool of potential partners does not necessarily mean the chances of finding a spouse are higher. In fact, the opposite is true: many users report feeling burned out and overwhelmed by too many options. Research shows that choice overload in online dating leads to deceased satisfaction and therefore a deceased likelihood of having romantic matches.

This was the experience of Valerie Landis, a 34-year-old women featured on NBC News, who was about to freeze her eggs for the second time:  

I believe social media has ruined dating: It's a hook-up culture, and no one gets to know each other long enough to know if they would be suitable partners beyond the romantic sense. Oftentimes, I’d go on meaningless dates, get stood up, blown off, or ghosted. How will those odds ever lead to a successful marriage or kids? Likely it won't. And it's rather exhausting.

There is a glimmer of hope among Gen-Z, who grew up in the digital age and are burnt out by online dating apps. Having never learned the traditional norms of dating, many Gen-Zs are now seeking more traditional ways to find connections. At a University of Virgina event, when a female student asked where to meet quality guys, Brett Cooper, a successful 24-year old independent journalist who got married at age 23, replied, “Running clubs are the new dating apps.” Her tips included going back to the community, attending church if you are religious, finding a hobby that is “communal,” and putting yourself out there to meet people in person. In short: go offline.   

It’s time to encourage young adults to try something different from today’s dating and marriage norms. Instead of delaying marriage, endlessly searching for that “perfect” person, and maximizing potential partners through dating apps, it is worth adopting a cornerstone marriage mindset, being cautious about the soulmate ideal, and giving real-life dating a chance. With this shift, young adults can break free from misguided dating practices and increase their chances of finding the right person to marry and build a family with.  

Wendy Wang is Director of Research at the Institute for Family Studies.

*Photo credit: Shutterstock