Why employers should only employ married men

Many social science studies have consistently shown that married men (on average) earn more than either single men or single or married women. In fact, this is the earnings order:

1. Married men
2. Single women
3. Single men
4. Married women

Dr. Warren Farrell documents this in his book "Why Men Earn More" which thoroughly debunks the "wage myth" that feminists use to reinforce their victim status.

The most reasonable explanations for the wage gap are motivation and specialization. Married men, especially with children, are found to be more dissatisfied with their wages and put in extra effort to earn more money to support their families. Single men without children simply don't have the same level of motivation to work, simply because their basic needs aren't being met. They are much more motivated towards other, more fundamental, things instead - like trying to have sex regularly.

Consider the other basic needs. When you are hungry, you can't really concentrate on other things like going to the gym, watching a movie, going to a concert, etc. Likewise if you need to go to the toilet, you can't concentrate on other things. Sex is similarly a basic need that needs to be met just like the other needs.

While work does have a direct relationship with hunger, it has only an indirect relationship with the fulfillment of sexual needs. That is, we satisfy our hunger by working. If we don't work, we don't get paid, and we starve. But most people do not work to get sex. Yes you can work and earn money and spend that money on prostitutes, but for the vast majority of men, such relationships are deeply unsatisfying because this lifestyle is not conducive to having children. Or you could work and earn status and power and wealth and these things increase your ability to get sex, but for most men this is too great an investment to make for a delayed and uncertain reward.

It follows that single men are less motivated to do work, because they've got nothing to work for. To them, life seems meaningless and empty. And they're constantly thinking about sex. They won't admit this of course, yet it's true.

Married men on the other hand, are more motivated because they have a wife and children to care for. Life doesn't seem so meaningless and empty anymore. Also, you don't just have the man's work - you have a woman's work behind it as well. Because a married man is simply more available for work, because his wife frees up significant amounts of his time by taking on domestic responsibilities that the man would otherwise have to do if he was single. In a sense, his wife invests her working potential in her husband's career for mutual gain.

Phyllis Schlafly would often speak at women's colleges in the late 70s and early 80s. She explained to them that even if they worked just as hard, and put in as many hours as their male counterparts, there is one advantage a man has that they'll never have; namely, a wife. And, of course, the response would come back, `Why can't a woman have a house-husband?'. Schlafly would respond, `Good luck finding one'. It's not impossible, but it's very improbable. (1)

If you are an employer, you would be wise to employ only married men. Your second choice would be single men, but only those who are planning to get married and have children in the near future. But if single women are more motivated and hardworking than single men, then why prefer men? Because if these single women are of childbearing age, then they are unreliable and potentially expensive employees - we must assume that they will get married or pregnant at some point in the future and you will have a higher employee turnover or other high costs (maternity leave, job sharing, etc) as a result. If you pass on these high costs to your customers, you will lose business to your more efficient competitors who don't employ women. If you pass on these high costs to your employees, you will lose your best employees to your competitors.

If instead perverse incentives are put in place that makes it "profitable to be inefficient" by penalizing companies that refuse to employ women, and by rewarding those who do employ women, then society as a whole will lose business to more efficient societies. Companies may move overseas, workers may choose to emigrate, etc.

1. Reader reviews of book "The Flipside of Feminism"