The Generation That Can’t Move On Up is also Losing Connections to Marriage and Religion

Andrew J. Cherlin and W. Bradford Wilcox write at the Wall Street Journal: “Most people assume that working-class members of the baby-boomer generation have been hurt the most by the outsourcing and automation in which millions of factory jobs moved overseas or disappeared into computer chips, a shift recently compounded by recession. But actually it may be their children’s generation. Not only are many members of the younger working class unprepared for the contemporary job market. New research we have done shows their striking inability to fit the middle-class ideal in family and religious life. It’s a worrisome development for their lifestyle and our culture . . . The grim employment picture is familiar, but what’s less widely known is that they are losing not only jobs but also their connections to basic social institutions such as marriage and religion. They’re becoming socially disengaged . . . ”