In Which I Offer Unsolicited and Unwelcome Nosy Advice to the Extremely Intelligent and Articulate Ta-Nehisi Coates

Megan McArdle writes:

Megan McArdle: Department of kind of awful statistics: I should probably just shutter the blog and redirect it to Ta-Nehisi Coates, but he keeps coming up with neat stuff. This on black illegitimacy. The stunning statistic that 70% of black babies are born out of wedlock is driven, to be sure, by the fact that many poor black women have a lot of children. But it turns out it is also driven by the fact that married black women have fewer children than married white women.

Ta-Nehisi suggests a reason for this that makes sense to me:

I'm effectively--if not legally--married. Been with the mother of my eight year old son for ten years now. More on this later. (I promise!) But basically when he was born I felt that he was the bond between us. In other words, he literally was the marriage ring. We'd both love to have more kids, but we simply can't afford it. Furthermore, we don't have particularly wealthy parents to fall back on. I think that's the situation a lot of married black folks find themselves in. They simply feel that they can't have more kids.

It's well known that the black middle class has a lot less in the way of assets than whites of similar income levels--hardly surprising, given the legacy of generations of discrimination and poverty. But that also means that things that a lot of white middle class people take for granted--like help with a down-payment on a house when you have your first kid--are less available. Middle class black parents have less in the way of a parental safety net than their white equivalents, so they're less likely to have a second kid.

So even though the statistic is basically correct--as Ta-Nehisi says, "Even if married black parents had kids at the rate that white married parents did (or better yet, Hispanic parents), black babies would still make up a disproportionate share of kids borne out of wedlock"--it's still worth interrogating, because the picture is considerably more complex than is generally implied.

I read this, and I cannot help but be reminded of the low comedy of Genesis 2:18-24:

And the Lord God said, It is not good that the male earth-creature should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him. And out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto the earth-creature to see what he would call them: and whatsoever the earth-creature called every living creature, that was the name thereof. And the earth-creature gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for the earth-creature there was not found an help meet for him.

And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the earth-creature and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; And the rib, which the Lord God had taken from the earth-creature, made he a woman, and brought her unto the the earth-creature.

And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh...

And respond that:

[H]oly Matrimony... is an honourable estate, instituted of God in the time of man's innocency... which holy estate Christ adorned and beautified with his presence, and first miracle that he wrought, in Cana of Galilee; and is commended of Saint Paul to be honourable among all men: and therefore is not by any to be enterprised, nor taken in hand, unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly... like brute beasts that have no understanding; but reverently, discreetly, advisedly, soberly, and in the fear of God; duly considering the causes for which Matrimony was ordained:

1. It was ordained for the procreation of children, to be brought up in the fear and nurture of the Lord, and to the praise of his holy Name...
2. It was ordained for a remedy against sin, and to avoid fornication; that such persons as have not the gift of continency might marry...
3. It was ordained for the mutual society, help, and comfort, that the one ought to have of the other, both in prosperity and adversity...

It's none of my business, I know. But I cannot help but think that people should be married and should have weddings, and say: "Propose, Mr. Coates, propose! At the very least it is a great excuse for a party--pot-luck receptions at home are at least as fun as the other kind!..."

Comments

[Nicholas Beaudrot]

Yes, there is a utility gain.

But what is the expected utility loss from divorce? Roughly one in three first marriages end in divorce, at least according to the Freakonomics blog. Thus the utility gain from marriage has to be equivalent to 150% of the utility loss from divorce for marriage to be a break-even proposition.

[Bernard Yomtov]

"It's well known that the black middle class has a lot less in the way of assets than whites of similar income levels--hardly surprising, given the legacy of generations of discrimination and poverty. But that also means that things that a lot of white middle class people take for granted--like help with a down-payment on a house when you have your first kid--are less available."

I venture to say this is NOT in fact well-known among many of McArdle's readers and admirers. If she spreads the word, with all its implications, that blacks are still today very much disadvantaged by the legacy of discrimination, it will redeem many of her past sins.

[jerry]

Brad, you may wish to consider that Coates is being rational here, and so is his partner, and then you may wish to ask yourself what are the rational reasons men and women in general, and african american men and women in specific have for not marrying.

Doing so may open your eyes to a great deal of economic truths, as well as certain truths and conflicts that are glossed over and in fact actively papered up and over by many of our "progressive liberal" buddies.

You may wish to put on your RSS feed Glenn Sacks at http://glennsacks.com/blog . You'll find he is a very progressive minded individual, who has studied many of the underlying social issues that men and women face in marriage and in our society. Some of his conclusions are anathema to some who we know and who have actively engaged in a smear campaign against him.

But, if you want to understand a bit more about marriage from those that do and those that now just say no thank you, and to understand the role you may be playing in that, he's a very enlightening read.

[jerry]

I venture to say this is NOT in fact well-known among many of McArdle's readers and admirers. If she spreads the word, with all its implications, that blacks are still today very much disadvantaged by the legacy of discrimination, it will redeem many of her past sins.

I know it seems truthy, and my gut tells me you are right Bernard, but I think you need to provide the data. My gut tells me you are right, but my head and experience tell me a lot of people who read McArdle agree with her and you about the distribution of assets and privilege amongst African Americans, just disagree with you on what the implications are.

[Matt]

Marriage is simply not commensurate with economic rationality. One can do ex post assessments of household wealth or poverty of the married, unmarried, those with kids or not, or those who spend vast sums trying - and sometimes succeeding to have a child - but try to tell me where the transmission mechanism is for that information, who puts it, knows it, and acts upon it, before saying I Do, or, more to the point Nope, I Don't. And then tell me about causality. I'm not knocking the question, I just don't think this discipline has the full picture or answer.

With deepest regrets for the impact on your professional futures, I feel duty bound to tell you to talk to sociologists, psychologists, anthropologists, sociolinguists, and, god help us, historians. I wish you all the best.

M

[David Yaseen]

If we take Bernard at his word, and we should just out sheer obviousness, I think I've hit on another reason a lot of black people don't get married: They can't afford weddings.

I see what some of my peers spend on their nuptials, and am gobsmacked. $50,000 is probably about average, and I'm not talking about wealthy people. A wedding is a show of status, a proxy for class. People who don't have the wherewithal to put on some kind of spectacle could be shamed right out of the whole institution. I'd bet the same is true of whites with utter ancestral dispossession somewhere in the last 3 or 4 generations.

[meno]

"It's none of my business, I know. But I cannot help but think that people should be married and should have weddings"

How *very* American.

A shame your US govt is not also willing to say "It's none of my business"

[chiasmus]

An error was found in post [http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2008/07/in-which-i-offe.html].

Code 0204: "articulate" detected in reference to an African-American.

Please reinstall common sense and reboot brain.

[Felix]

Ah, Chiasmus beat me to it.

[ogmb]

"Thus the utility gain from marriage has to be equivalent to 150% of the utility loss from divorce for marriage to be a break-even proposition."

Marriages, like wars, happen if both sides overestimate their chances of success.

[anonymous coward]

What should common sense tell Professor DeLong, and why should it tell him that? I am often pretty dense, so I beg you please don't be niggardly in your explanation.

[anonymous coward]

From that NY Times piece in Chiasmus signature: "here is a pointer. Do not use it as the primary attribute of note for a black person if you would not use it for a similarly talented, skilled or eloquent white person. Do not make it an outsized distinction for Brown University’s president, Ruth Simmons, if you would not for the University of Michigan’s president, Mary Sue Coleman. Do not make it the sole basis for your praise of the actor Forest Whitaker if it would never cross your mind to utter it about the expressive Peter O’Toole."

And that is the problem I have with common sense. Once Brad removes "articulate" from his compliment of Coates, is it okay for Brad to call him "Extremely Intelligent?" Because at that point, that too would seem to smack of the racial insensitivity of the stereotypical white amazement that seems to be at the heart of the "articulate" problem.

Geoffrey Nunberg has written about the dying art of giving a good speech that seemed to occur after Kennedy, and it is Nunberg's position (IIRC) that we have Television and Vietnam to blame in many ways for American politicians being unable to give good speech.

And no one would deny that we've had 8 years of a drooling idiot who no one would ever claim was articulate in any way shape or form.

In contrast to Bush, in the throes of Iraq, is it unbelievable that the American people would reach out to the candidate they feel is most articulate, because they feel that "articulate" is a good proxy for intelligent, capable, and truth telling?

Clemetson in the Times suggests that articulate not be used "as the primary attribute of note for a black person if you would not use it for a similarly talented, skilled or eloquent white person", but that shouldn't be turned into yet another unthinking, irrational, missing the point, corrupting, zero tolerance policy.

Given DeLong's habit of complimenting people as "treasures", is it so outrageous for DeLong to refer to a blogger he likes as "extremely intelligent and articulate?" (And especially coming from DeLong, the polymath that he is, well, it takes one to know one.)

What involves more common sense, that DeLong is being racially insensitive here and is amazed that Coates can write well, or that DeLong believes that of all the people he reads, Coates writes extremely intelligently and writes well?

Or is the common sense that this is just a battle no one should fight because right or wrong, common sense is not likely to be used in the interpretation? If the latter, I think all of us lose.

[Ta-Nehisi Coates]

For the record. I take it as a compliment and appreciate the advice. I'm working on a long post wherein I elaborate on the decision we made, as well as lay out our ongoing discussions (we had another one just yesterday).

[ogmb]

"Code 0204: "articulate" detected in reference to an African-American."

Wow, I did not know that scanning for most objectionable interpretation is an automated task now.

[PaulC]

I was unfamiliar with the second passage till I googled it. I'm relieved to find that it is part of an Anglican wedding and not part of any proposed legislation or constitutional amendment (yet).

[Ken Houghton]

All right, I know I'm dumber than McMegan, Coates, and DeLong combined, but when I look at the Census data comparison of White Only and Black Only Family Households, the ONLY place where the percent of White Only is higher than the percent of Black Only is for "two people"--i.e., no children.

So where does "the fact that married black women have fewer children than married white women" come from?? Doesn't appear to be from data.

PDF link: http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/race/black/ppl-186/tab5.pdf

[Ta-Nehisi Coates]

Ken,

I'm not sure we're comparing the same thing. I'm talking about the birth rate among married couples. That's not the same as the number of people in a household--there could be grandkids, cousins, stepchildren (I hate that term), grandparents etc. But more to the point "household" isn't the same as "married couple." Anyway for a look at the data check out this post I did here:

http://www.ta-nehisi.com/2008/07/even-more-on-out-of-wedlock-births.html

My data is pulled from the National Center for Health Statistics, an arm of the CDC. They track birth rate (x number per 1,000 women). I actually look for Census data with that sort of specificity and didn't see any--which sort of makes sense, when you think about what the Census actually is.

[jerry]

Being a father is one amazingly great experience. Fun, rewarding, enlightening, humbling, and did I say fun? My youngest just had a birthday yesterday.

I actually encourage marriage, and suspect and hope most will turn out better than mine. But in a world of no fault divorce (which is a good thing), we also need a rebuttable presumption of joint and shared physical custody. Feminist organizations claim that custody frequently, usually goes to the father. We should all grasp reality and reject patent nonsense. What does it tell you happens in the courts when NOW lobbies to keep sole custody laws and stop rebuttable presumption of shared custody laws, and fathers' groups are the ones lobbying for rebuttable presumption of shared custody laws?

Whether you folks choose to marry or not, all three of you have my absolute best wishes for the future.

[Leila Abu-Saba]

I like being married but it seems to me that how Ta-Nehisi Coates chooses to organize his family life is entirely none of my business. It's hard for me to imagine that Brad DeLong is really using his blog to urge anybody, "intelligent" or not, to engage in a civil or religious ceremony involving a supposedly lifetime contract between two persons. Is that what you're doing by reposting the McArdle post? I am puzzled.

[AIMAI.]

Yeah, I've got to agree with leila abu saba on this one. Its pretty much none of our business. Marriage isn't for everyone--and it can be very expensive to boot. Formal marriage in western society grows out of a complex set of social and economic laws on inheritance of paternal property. No property? No need for marriage. There are some advantages for non working women, still, in marriage and some advantages in terms of long term inheritance and care issues, as well as issues relating to children's benefits, but most of those can be negotiated by the parties concerned--with the exception of co inheritance without taxation of spousal property.

That being said, I'm happilly married and I value marriage as a rich symbol of my committment to my spouse, and his to me. But I kinda think someone who has had a child already and waited eight years must think about it differently--I'd kick him out of my bed and my home, but if his significant other doesn't, well, its nobodies business but hers.

aimai

[AIMAI.]

Needless to say, Jerry's remark above:

"Feminist organizations claim that custody frequently, usually goes to the father. We should all grasp reality and reject patent nonsense."

Is, itself, patent nonsense.

aimai

[jerry]

Kathy G, would you care to support that with some statistics or cites? Or is cant all you have to go on?

As I said Kathy, if you think that fathers get kids most often then please answer why NOW and so many feminists support sole custody laws and it is the fathers groups begging, not for SOLE custody, but for SHARED custody? What is the marketplace of ideas and their lobbyists telling you?

I'll show you my sources:

http://www.glennsacks.com/blog/?page_id=1000

"#18: "Men win custody in only 10% of contested custody cases"
(Note: To avoid confusion: the sources below do not all indicate 10%--some indicate 15 or 20%, some indicate less than 5%. As a whole, the average is around 10%.)

Source: Eleanor E. Maccoby and Robert H. Mnookin, Dividing the Child (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1992), pp. 104-105, 149-150.

Source: Stephen J. Bahr, J.D. Howe, M. Morrill Mann, "Trends in Custody Awards: Has the Removal of Maternal Preference Made a Difference?", Family Law Quarterly, Vol, pp. 247-267, Summer 1994.

Source: Wendy Reiboldt and Sharon Seiling, "Factors Related to Men's Award of Custody," Family Advocate, Winter 1993, pp. 42-44. Published by the Family Law Section of the American Bar Association.

Source: William T. K. Dolan, Esq., Empirical Study of Child Custody in Divorce Decrees in Arlington County, Virginia: July 1, 1989--December 30, 1990, © 1991.

Source: Rich Blake, "Father Says System is Unfair to Men in Custody Battles," Alexander (VA) Gazette Packet, October 22, 1992 .

Source: Robert Seidenberg, The Father's Emergency Guide to Divorce-Custody Battle, JES Books, 1997, pp. 11-15, 60-61.

John P. McCahey, J.D., LL.M, et al., Child Custody and Visitation Law and Practice. Matthew Bender, New York. Volume 3, 1983, Section 13.01.

#19: The commonly cited factoid that “men win custody half of the time or more when they contest it” is a myth.

Source: "Do fathers have the edge in divorce?," Cathy Young, Detroit News, December 10, 1996. See: http://www.vix.com/menmag/youngdet.htm.

Source: Robert Seidenberg, The Father's Emergency Guide to Divorce-Custody Battle, JES Books, 1997, pp. 11-15, 60-61."

[Maynard Handley]

"We'd both love to have more kids, but we simply can't afford it."

And why exactly should we (the rest of humanity) be sorry about this?
I won't say that every problem on earth is caused by overpopulation, but pretty much all the big ones are. The shame here is not that Ta-Nehisi Coates gets only one kid, but that most of the rest of humanity is too damn irresponsible to follow his lead and that social policies, rather than reflecting the true costs of children, do everything they can to reduce those costs.

If Ta-Nehisi Coates or his supporters think it's "unfair" that the poor get to have one kid and the rich get to have three, do the responsible thing and get congress to pass a law allowing *everyone* only one kid.
Or, alternatively, deny the situation and then wonder around surprised as the structure of civilization crumbles over the next 50 years (starting from the poorest countries, where it's pretty much already taken root, and moving outwards).

[Ta-Nehisi Coates]

Meh, do me a solid and at least respond to what's actually in the post. I don't think "unfairness" came up at all in the discussion. You don't have to agree with me. But at least disagree with what I'm actually saying, not with what's easiest to argue against. For the record, the point of the post was to contextualize that vaunted 70 percent figure. Nothing more. Nothing less.