What’s the source for this oft repeated assertion?

[tamade]

I just watched a short clip where a lady says that by any measure of welfare (lists life expectancy, wealth, MH, and many more things) unmarried and childless women are better off. And for men the opposite is true. She says it is because the women pour their hearts and lives into their families.

It sounds plausible and I read similar comments on here every few weeks. I just googled it and the first half a dozen links, including papers seemed to say the opposite: everyone is better off in a couple (married or otherwise).

So where does this theory come from? What’s the truth?
Is it reasonable to accept the statement?

Yes. The secret to happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have.

Yes, sorry I didn't phrase that very well and realised after I'd posted. Actually the happiest couples I know in my age group (60's) are those that never had children whether by choice or not.

what did you google? I googled 'single women happiest' and got back links to the exact studies.
From what I can see the initial assertion comes from an American Time Use Survey c. 2018 and a 'happiness expert' wrote a book on it and gave speeches etc. Some people have since said that he misinterpreted some of the answers.

This gives a summary of other studies on the topic https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/19485506241287960

but ultimately, why does it matter? 100% of other people could say that ice cream tastes better than cake, but if I prefer cake then I'll buy cake! I can only evaluate my own happiness.

We only know the lives we are living and can't definitively say whether we would be happier or unhappier in different circumstances. I might think I'd be happier single than married to my friend Amy's husband Bob, but she loves Bob so would be happier married to him than single. I could be in an unhappy relationship with Colin so, if responding to the survey, might be recorded as being unhappier than my single neighbour Jane, but if I'd married Jack instead I could have been happier than her. So it's not marriage itself that's the relevant factor, it's the specific person.

There are so many variable factors e.g. in some cases it's the benefits (like financial) marriage can bring rather than being married itself - e.g. if a woman had a household income (whether that's joint or her sole wage) of £50k she might find life less of a struggle than with a single income of £25k.

Even if you asked the same person, their happiness level could change from month to month. For me, being single during lockdown, for example, (particularly before bubbles) was much harder than being single when you could go out and have as much human interaction as you wanted. But the same would probably apply to those in unhappy relationships/DV.

The default assumption seems to be that increased life expectancy is a good thing, but I'm not convinced that it is, beyond a certain point.

@Miaowzabella

I have to agree with you to be honest.

Does it depend on your yardstick for measuring?

I'm single with adult children and I'm the happiest and wealthiest I've ever been. My last couple of relationships were not exactly wonderful. my children are all independent and solvent and I can pretty much do as I want without the financial drain of a man wanting things or the kids needing things. I'm at the age where I'm still healthy and able to get out and about. I regard this (I'm mid sixties) as the sweet spot.

But I can imagine that someone in my position who doesn't have kids might be lonely, or who doesn't have money might be stressed. I live in a lovely cottage in a gorgeous rural setting - someone exactly like me only with noisy neighbours in an urban environment might not have it so good.

So much is individual.

There are so many metrics aren’t there? I think on many I am living what is supposed to be the dream family life and in many respects I am and am very happy. Yet there is so much expectation out on women - I was a very success in woman in a long-hours creative business who led quite a wild and free ‘bohemian’ life. Now, in order to give my kids the most productive start in life, I am living in a nice safe conventional town and working in a nice stable conventional job for which I’m very grateful but my life has zero edge and I seem to be committed for every hour I’m awake with a huge domestic load as DH works away in the week. Also the days of throwing money at that problem to make it better are over due to CoL crisis.

I’m not sure if I would in fact be happier now living as I was in a less routine, predictable less electric life - maybe that would now feel a bit tiring! But yes I have definitely made life choices in the interest of making my children’s lives better and not my own. The kids however do bring me a deep and frequent joy I never really anticipated. Still have teens to go though!

The stats likely don't take into account how complex life is.

Just as one example, single parents are far more like statistically to be carers for children with disabilities. That's because you are much more likely to get divorced if you have a disabled child, and the Mum is nearly always the main carer. Having a disabled child means you're more likely to have mental health issues, low income etc. With knock-on effect on mental wellbeing etc.

I am in a lot of carer groups for parents of autistic children and I have yet to see a single Dad at any of those groups. Rarely a man at all, for that matter. The difference is that when still in a relationship there is often more of a financial and practical buffer.

"I think statistically men are much less likely to stick around with a sick spouse"

Yes, I've seen that too. Shocking how many men leave their ill wives.

"cohabiting in USA is much less stable than cohabiting in Europe including UK."

Possibly because it's less common there so the types of couples that cohabit instead of getting married are less stable? I think the ONS showed that when cohabiting was less common, cohabiting before marriage led to higher divorce rates, but when cohabiting became more common, the opposite became true.

No, it's not. People talk about healthspan now i.e. how long you can live an active, independent life.

People often get mixed up with correlation and causation.

You would need to separate people who have chosen to be single vs those single through circumstances such as DV, children with disabilities, having health issues etc.

As an aside I've been reading some stats from fathers rights organisations about how children being cared for only by one parent (generally the mum) have significantly higher chance of living in poverty, being mentally unwell, having experienced DV etc. Which is true. But they then use this as evidence to say that children must therefore ALWAYS be better off with equal care with both parents. Which is a massively flawed assumption when it doesn't take into account the possible reasons those children don't have contact with the other parent in the first place.

"You can't die in childbirth if you don't have a child so is that not a factor."

In the rich world in 2025? No, I wouldn't think so!
The OECD rate is currently at 22 per 100,000 compared with 5% in the middle ages.

The earliest I'm aware of is from the Camberwell studies in the 1960s, quite early in the 60s IIRC. The research came up with some interesting findings - married men 'happiest', then single women, then married women and lastly single men.

They also found that 1 in 10 people were clinically depressed at some point in their lives and that church attendance was a 'protection' against depression.

I have no idea if this was ever replicated in Camberwell or elsewhere. I'm sure if there was a similar study today it would provide much more nuanced findings, as the research techniques have improved if nothing else. It was still well regarded as a body of research in the 1980s when I was at uni, studying Psychology. It made total sense to me then as a single woman and it makes total sense to me now as a partnered woman.