[ble]

Interesting. What personal experiences or survey data are you drawing on for these conclusions? All of what you say sounds like solid, believable inferences but I doubt most people are exposed to enough data about the interaction of family life and work to draw meaningful generalizations. (If you turn out to be a professor of quantitative sociology, my face will be bright red :) ).

[sandworm101]

I am not a sociologist, but I do have a number of subordinates. I have people with domestic violence issues, people who cannot work late due to child custody handover times and even restraining orders between divorcing partners who both work at the same company. The single people seem to be more stable, the confirmed bachelors even more so.

[kelipso]

You work in the military though, so not exactly the same culture as the average white collar worker.

[ForestCritter]

When it comes to retail and factories, singles are much less reliable than parents. From my e xperience at least.

[judge2020]

For white collar it's probably a different story. These are people the book mentions, bachelors or married couples choosing not to have kids for 'selfish' reasons. They have the money to thrive and experience as much personal pleasure as they want, be it in consumerism or plain free time, and don't want children to take away from that. But for retail workers, If one day doesn't break the bank (due to their low income already disqualifying them from taking on too much of a debt obligation), and a day working retail is another day of pure agony, they're more likely to take the hit by calling out sick or not showing up to instead do the things they want to do.