EA Relationship Status

I have two observations from the 2018 EA survey demographic data:

80% of EAs are atheist/agnostic/non-religious and 3% are Buddhist, compared to 15-20% and 1% in the US population. These categories have lower marriage rates than the general population.
Because EAs tend to be so young (modal age 25), the median age of EAs in the 25-34 age group appears to be around 28, compared to around 30 for the general US population. Similarly, the median age within the 35-44 age group appears to be around 38, compared to 40. Since marriage rate increases so sharply with age for people 25-34 with at least a bachelor's degree, this makes a sizable difference in the expected marriage rate.

Another factor that might be in play is, if you're married with children then you have responsibilities towards your family, and that is an incentive against spending resources on altruistic causes.

[-]Gordon Seidoh Worley5y70

I'm surprised also by the relatively low "ever married" rates for the above 45 segments, since marriage rates were higher in the past and those people have had more chances to have gotten married, so barely cresting 60% suggests EA is somehow correlated with folks who don't get married, robust to those people having many opportunities to get married prior to EA coalescing as a movement. I would have expected something closer to 85%.

[-]ozziegooen5y70

Quick thoughts:
1) I found this interesting, thanks!
2) There's a significant gender imbalance in the Bay Area scene at least.
3) Lots of EAs I know are in Academia; either getting advanced degrees or doing research. Academia presents a lot of challenges to relationships, I would be curious how our statistics compare to those in Academia.
4) Many of my non-EA friends seem to place great value on relationships, my EA friends less so.
5) I would be surprised if poly actually made that big of a difference. My guess would be that it's not actually that popular in EA. I get the impression that poly sounds radical and has been discussed by some of the key people, so seems like a much bigger deal than it really is.

[-]remizidae5y20

The gender imbalance would only matter if EAs are reluctant to marry outside the group—is that the speculation here?

[-]ozziegooen5y50

First, mostly; it is the speculation. Second, in the Bay Area, there's also a gender imbalance outside of EA.

[-]jefftk5y50

On the other hand, talking to a friend in the Bay area rationality scene, it sounds like maybe even with the gender imbalance there are more women looking to settle down than men? In which case the gender imbalance is actually likely making marriage more common?

[-]ozziegooen5y40

Good to know, I wasn't aware.

Maybe there's some small benefit there, but I'd still be surprised if the gender imbalance on net increased the percentage of marriages.

[-]remizidae5y40

This is pure speculation, but is there a geographic skew towards CA Bay Area, and if so, how do Bay Area marriage rates compare to the rest of US?

[-]Mati_Roy5y*30

It seems plausible to me that hardcore people have less people in their interest-cluster.

Mayyybe this predicts more marriages per EA in places with a larger local EA community (EtA: otherwise, there might be no good match at all in your city)

[-]hg005y10

Dating is a project that can easily suck up a lot of time and attention, and the benefits seem really dubious (I know someone who had their life ruined by a bad divorce).

I would be interested in the opposite question: Why *would* an EA try and find someone to marry? I'm not trying to be snarky, I genuinely want to hear why in case I should change my strategy. The only reason I can think of is if you're a patient longtermist and you think your kids are more likely to be EAs.

[-]jefftk5y20

While we don't have controlled studies, married people do tend to be happier. Overall, many married people find the companionship of having another person to spend their life with fulfilling, rewarding, comforting, and generally very positive.

There is a risk of an unhappy marriage, but there is also a risk of missing out on what could be a really important relationship.

You could consider talking to people a few decades older than you who seem like the kind of people you might be in a few decades time, and asking whether they're married and how they feel about it?

[-]Mati_Roy5y10

If anyone wants to do that, I would be really interested in seeing such an analysis but for children, as I see relationship status mostly as a proxy for that, but probably not a very good one. If no one does it, I might do it at some point.

[-]jefftk5y30

Was number of children ever asked on an EA survey?

[-]Mati_Roy5y10

I just made a quick search, and it seems like it never was :o

[-]romeostevensit5y00

Utilitarians code as defectors to normal people for good reason.

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EA Relationship Status

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