Do millennial men want barefoot-and-pregnant wives? Survey says…

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A set of reports released Friday by the Council on Contemporary Families reveals an unexpected trend about millennials and their attitudes toward gender relationships within a family. Interestingly, these surveys show fewer of the youngest millennials — ages 18 to 25 — support egalitarian family arrangements than the same age group did 20 years ago.

One survey has looked at the attitudes of high school seniors for almost 40 years; an interesting trend has appeared in recent years. While the percentage of young people holding egalitarian views on gender relationships rose between 1977 and the mid-90s, it has actually decreased since then. In 1994, 42 percent of high school seniors believed the best family was one in which the man was the main breadwinner and the woman stayed at home. In 2014, however, 58 percent of seniors said this was their preferred arrangement.

Here are a few more stats from this set of reports by the Council on Contemporary Families:

• In 1994, fewer than 30 percent of seniors agreed “the husband should make all the important decisions in the family.” By 2014, nearly 40 percent thought this way.

• Another study found 83 percent of men rejected the superiority of the male breadwinner setup. That figure fell to 55 percent by 2014. The percentage of women disagreeing with this same statement dropped to a lesser degree, from 85 percent to 72 percent in the same time span.

• Since 1994, women’s confidence that employed women are just as good mothers as SAHMs has continued to rise. By 2014, though, men were more traditional than their elders on this topic.

As a millennial on the older end of the generational spectrum, this trend is surprising to me. I’m currently a stay-at-home mom (by choice) who contributes to the income of my family, but I also worked outside of the home until my oldest was 3. It’s insulting to think so many young men emerging into adulthood think working moms aren’t as good mothers. I certainly don’t feel my kids suffered in any way from my outside employment. And there’s even evidence suggesting children of working mothers have a number of advantages.

Image by Thinkstock; chart via Contemporaryfamilies.org

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