THOUGHTS ON THE MARRIAGE WAGE PREMIUM. My favorite bit: “While traditional wives certainly add great economic value to the family as a whole, the specialization argument falls flat in my opinion when considering the question of married men’s higher earnings. The problem with the argument is it assumes married men are free to focus more of their time and mental energy on paid work than unmarried men. If this were correct, married men should then be free to work longer hours and travel more for business than unmarried men. The basic assumption is that bachelors are too tied down focusing on housekeeping, cooking meals from scratch, and doing their laundry to really focus on paid work. This is to put it mildly, counter-intuitive.”

UPDATE: Reader Charles Weigle emails: “When I was a young lawyer, one of the older partners at the firm explained to me that a married man with small children made the best employee because (1) he would do anything for more money and (2) he would rather stay at the office than go home in the evenings. I never did get married.”