2026
June 26th
Class differences in happiness among men
Unhappiness is on the rise for American men, and the working class is getting hardest hit. Recent data show that 27% of men between 25 and 44 without a college degree report being unhappy, a 12-percentage-point increase from the 2010s. By comparison, 17% of men with a college degree in this age range report being unhappy. IFS research shows that some of this class disparity is explained by differing childhood experiences. Working-class men between 25 and 44 were 11 percentage points less likely than their college-educated peers to have had a good relationship with their father, and 8 percentage points less likely to have had a good relationship with their mother growing up.
