Establishing a 'livable wage' floor would immediately reduce the gap in average pay between American women and men.

Stephanie Coontz

Social and economic policies constructed around the male breadwinner model have always disadvantaged women.

Stephanie Coontz

Our goal should be to develop work-life policies that enable people to put their gender values into practice. So let's stop arguing about the hard choices women make and help more women and men avoid such hard choices.

Stephanie Coontz

The growing diversity of family life comes with new possibilities as well as new challenges.

Stephanie Coontz

Some people may long for an era when divorce was still hard to come by. The spread of no-fault divorce has reduced the bargaining power of whichever spouse is more interested in continuing the relationship. And the breakup of such marriages has caused pain for many families.

Stephanie Coontz

Rising inequality has changed family dynamics for all socioeconomic groups.

Stephanie Coontz

Turning back the inequality revolution may be difficult. But that would certainly help more families - at almost all income levels - than turning back the gender revolution.

Stephanie Coontz

Marriage is no longer the only place where people make major life transitions and decisions, enter into commitments, or incur obligations.

Stephanie Coontz

Many alternatives to traditional marriage have emerged. People feel free to shop around, experimenting with several living arrangements in succession. And when people do marry, they have different expectations and goals.

Stephanie Coontz

For a century, women have binged on romance novels that encouraged them to associate intimidation with infatuation; it's no wonder that this emotional hangover still lingers.

Stephanie Coontz

As a historian, I've spent much of my career warning people about the dangers of nostalgia.

Stephanie Coontz

In my work as a historian and in my relationships as a friend, teacher, wife, and mother, I have come to think that the most useful way to understand the past and make it work for you is to look at the trade-offs and contradictions that, however deeply buried, can be uncovered in every memory, good or bad.

Stephanie Coontz

There's nothing wrong with celebrating the good things in our past. But memories, like witnesses, do not always tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. We need to cross-examine them, recognizing and accepting the inconsistencies and gaps in those that make us proud and happy as well as those that cause us pain.

Stephanie Coontz

As an overly confident college freshman, the first time I received a below-average score on an exam was a needed wake-up call.

Stephanie Coontz

It's always seductive to know where one stands in relation to the average.

Stephanie Coontz

Averages are useful because many traits, behaviors, and outcomes are distributed in a bell-shaped curve, with most results clustered around the middle and a much smaller group of outliers at the high and low ends.

Stephanie Coontz

When we assume that 'normal' people need 'time to heal,' or discourage individuals from making any decisions until a year or more after a loss, as some grief counselors do, we may be giving inappropriate advice. Such advice can cause people who feel ready to move on to wonder if they are hardhearted.

Stephanie Coontz

Heterosexuals were the upstarts who turned marriage into a voluntary love relationship rather than a mandatory economic and political institution.

Stephanie Coontz

Giving married women an independent legal existence did not destroy heterosexual marriage. And allowing husbands and wives to construct their marriages around reciprocal duties and negotiated roles - where a wife can choose to be the main breadwinner and a husband can stay home with the children - was an immense boon to many couples.

Stephanie Coontz

Marriage has been in a constant state of evolution since the dawn of the Stone Age. In the process, it has become more flexible - but also more optional.

Stephanie Coontz

Stephanie Coontz Quotes

Establishing a 'livable wage' floor would immediately reduce the gap in average pay between American women and men.

Social and economic policies constructed around the male breadwinner model have always disadvantaged women.

Our goal should be to develop work-life policies that enable people to put their gender values into practice. So let's stop arguing about the hard choices women make and help more women and men avoid such hard choices.

The growing diversity of family life comes with new possibilities as well as new challenges.

Some people may long for an era when divorce was still hard to come by. The spread of no-fault divorce has reduced the bargaining power of whichever spouse is more interested in continuing the relationship. And the breakup of such marriages has caused pain for many families.

Rising inequality has changed family dynamics for all socioeconomic groups.

Turning back the inequality revolution may be difficult. But that would certainly help more families - at almost all income levels - than turning back the gender revolution.

Marriage is no longer the only place where people make major life transitions and decisions, enter into commitments, or incur obligations.

Many alternatives to traditional marriage have emerged. People feel free to shop around, experimenting with several living arrangements in succession. And when people do marry, they have different expectations and goals.

For a century, women have binged on romance novels that encouraged them to associate intimidation with infatuation; it's no wonder that this emotional hangover still lingers.

As a historian, I've spent much of my career warning people about the dangers of nostalgia.

As an overly confident college freshman, the first time I received a below-average score on an exam was a needed wake-up call.

It's always seductive to know where one stands in relation to the average.

Averages are useful because many traits, behaviors, and outcomes are distributed in a bell-shaped curve, with most results clustered around the middle and a much smaller group of outliers at the high and low ends.

Heterosexuals were the upstarts who turned marriage into a voluntary love relationship rather than a mandatory economic and political institution.

Marriage has been in a constant state of evolution since the dawn of the Stone Age. In the process, it has become more flexible - but also more optional.