Where The Singles Are
You may recall this chart, showing which cities have a surplus of single men and which have a surplus of single women, making the rounds on the tubes a while back:
An interesting result. But now via Ezra Klein, a more interesting result — an interactive map of the same data that lets you examine particular age brackets. What it shows is that the age-linked variation is much larger than the geographical variation. Women tend to marry earlier than men, so in younger cohorts men outnumber women everywhere. Here’s the 20-34 bracket:
Single men outnumber single women everywhere in the young bracket. Fun fact: “The switchover from extra men to extra women starts at 35-39 for most big East Coast cities, but doesn’t hit New York until 40-44.” Of course in practice dating is rather socioeconomically bounded, and the number of number of single male high school dropouts in a given metro area has relatively little to do with a college educated professional woman’s dating prospects (though my dad didn’t finish high school and my mom went to Cornell so I’m well aware that there are exceptions), so even this more sophisticated model still leaves some real gaps in one’s understanding.
64 Responses to “Where The Singles Are”
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October 23rd, 2008 at 12:50 pm
So basically, if anybody went to New York looking for hot single girls off of that first chart, they ended up surrounded by widowed grandmas.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:00 pm
though my dad didn’t finish high school and my mom went to Cornell so I’m well aware that there are exceptions
Your dad ain’t exactly the typical high school dropout, having dropped out to publish his first novel (about a brilliant teenager who drops out of high school).
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:00 pm
This is excellent news for the single L.A. gay. Unless of course you are an over 30 single L.A. gay, because nothing is excellent news for the over 30 single L.A. gay.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:02 pm
Is this data just for citizens and legal residents? If it includes everyone, then I would guess that immigration may also skew the younger cohorts toward male predominance, since men traditionally were a larger % of immigrants than women. This may have changed in some places and in some occupations, but the construction boom of the past 5-6 years certainly drew in a lot of males in the younger age cohorts, especially to the blue circles on the first map.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:07 pm
It would be interesting if there was a chart also broken out by sexual orientation.
Things in NYC may not be as bad for young, single heterosexual men as the chart implies.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:07 pm
Quick! Everyone to Springfield!
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:08 pm
“So basically, if anybody went to New York looking for hot single girls off of that first chart, they ended up surrounded by widowed grandmas.”
I beg to differ.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Check out the 18-24 demographic. See Tallahassee? Florida State! Florida State! Florida State! wooo!!
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:14 pm
One thing that may complicate the numbers is the extent to which de facto polygamy is a real phenomenon. Also known as soft polygamy, it occurs when two or more women share an Alpha male, sometimes knowingly, sometimes not. Lesser, “Beta” males are left out in the cold. It’s a very popular blogosphere meme, especially on angry-nerds-who-can’t-get-laid sites like Roissy’s, but like the mail-order bride industry, yet another blogosphere meme, actual numbers may be very modest. We just don’t have the statistics to know for sure.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:26 pm
but like the mail-order bride industry, yet another blogosphere meme, actual numbers may be very modest. We just don’t have the statistics to know for sure.
Don’t knock the idea of non-romantic marriages. Several of the younger men (which is almost everyone) I know have happy marriages that were arranged rather than the I-love-you-you-love-me variety.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:34 pm
Does this include people in prison? Younger males still make up the majority of people in the prison industrial complex.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:40 pm
I sure didn’t address socioeconomics in the map, but luckily someone else did it for education! It isn’t nearly as pretty, but it’s plenty useful.
October 23rd, 2008 at 1:58 pm
This graph is terrible as it fails to show the percentages instead of absolute numbers. In terms of percentages, New York destroys the rest of the country in terms of single female to single male ratio in the 18-45 demographic. It’s still barely one, but it’s better than you get everywhere else. So yes, NYC is the place to go if you’re a single guy (and can afford it).
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:01 pm
No wonder I can’t find a girlfriend in Chicago!
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:02 pm
One thing that may complicate the numbers is the extent to which de facto polygamy is a real phenomenon. Also known as soft polygamy, it occurs when two or more women share an Alpha male, sometimes knowingly, sometimes not. Lesser, “Beta” males are left out in the cold. It’s a very popular blogosphere meme, especially on angry-nerds-who-can’t-get-laid sites like Roissy’s, but like the mail-order bride industry, yet another blogosphere meme, actual numbers may be very modest. We just don’t have the statistics to know for sure.
I’m pretty sure this effect is overstated. If you’re a young woman sleeping with an older man for his money (and you’re in mistress territory), where is your real motivation to be faithful? You think that girl isn’t capable of hooking up with exciting younger men on the side? Given the demographics of cheating spouses (fairly balanced), I’m pretty sure the only way for polygamy to work is for it to be enforced like in the old times (or in the middle east).
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:07 pm
This graph is terrible as it fails to show the percentages instead of absolute numbers.
Hit the spacebar to switch between adjusted for population and not. Anyway, the only three metro areas with more 18-44 women than men would appear to be Durham, NC, Springfield, MA, and New Orleans. (Though NYC isn’t broken away from NJ and northern PA.)
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:07 pm
So, your dad’s slumming, is he . . . God, Cornell jokes just make themselves.
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:22 pm
Hit the spacebar to switch between adjusted for population and not. Anyway, the only three metro areas with more 18-44 women than men would appear to be Durham, NC, Springfield, MA, and New Orleans. (Though NYC isn’t broken away from NJ and northern PA.)
I hadn’t clicked through, but that is pretty cool, then. I’ve seen this data before localized to NYC, and I think NYC does even better. It’s not doing bad here though, beating out the other major metropolises quite handily.
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:26 pm
If you’re a young woman sleeping with an older man for his money (and you’re in mistress territory), where is your real motivation to be faithful? You think that girl isn’t capable of hooking up with exciting younger men on the side?
The Angry Nerd response would be that yes, while the young woman is unlikely to be faithful, the men with whom she’s hooking up are Alphas themselves. She’s not going to give the time of day to some introverted Beta loser nerd.
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:46 pm
The Angry Nerd response would be that yes, while the young woman is unlikely to be faithful, the men with whom she’s hooking up are Alphas themselves. She’s not going to give the time of day to some introverted Beta loser nerd.
Yeah, but this is just were you drop the discussion. There is no world where ‘beta’ men are going to be hooking up with hot women. But in the actual world, men, even betas can find partners as long as their standards are not at maxim cover levels. And I seriously doubt there is a cabal of ‘alpha’ men hooking up with a much larger group of hot women who are then excluded from dating the remaining pool of men.
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:49 pm
“The Angry Nerd response would be that yes, while the young woman is unlikely to be faithful, the men with whom she’s hooking up are Alphas themselves. She’s not going to give the time of day to some introverted Beta loser nerd.”
So, are The Angry Nerds officially in favor of imposing universal arranged marriages and capital punishment for adultery? Because that seems to be what introverted Beta loser nerds would need to truly solve their problem…
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:49 pm
mpowell beat me to the spot…
October 23rd, 2008 at 2:56 pm
So, are The Angry Nerds officially in favor of imposing universal arranged marriages and capital punishment for adultery? Because that seems to be what introverted Beta loser nerds would need to truly solve their problem…
Actually, Petey, I think the point of the exercise is so that fellows like Roissy can justify to themselves being enormous douchebags in their attitudes towards and treatment of women. It is really just an elaborate process of resolving cognitive dissonance.
October 23rd, 2008 at 3:04 pm
Ok, so now can we get this run through a socioeconomic and educational filter? I’m looking to relocate, and this would be really useful data to have.
October 23rd, 2008 at 3:09 pm
There is no world where ‘beta’ men are going to be hooking up with hot women. But in the actual world, men, even betas can find partners as long as their standards are not at maxim cover levels. And I seriously doubt there is a cabal of ‘alpha’ men hooking up with a much larger group of hot women who are then excluded from dating the remaining pool of men.
That’s just the point. It may indeed be doubtful that de facto polygamy is a major issue and is shutting large numbers of Beta men out of the marriage market, but we just don’t know for sure. At least in the case of mail-order brides, which as I noted in another favorite blogosphere meme, we can get a rough idea of the numbers involved by looking at the number of fiancee/foreign spouse visas issued each year.* But if there are any reliable statistics as to how many Alpha males are simultanously romancing multiple women, no one’s seen them. Hence the ability of the Angry Nerd sites like Roissy’s to proclaim this as a major issue when in fact it might not be.
–
I think the point of the exercise is so that fellows like Roissy can justify to themselves being enormous douchebags in their attitudes towards and treatment of women.
You ought to read Roissy’s most recent post (caution: much vulgarity). Good God, what an angry attitude.
* = if every person entering the United States on a fiancee/foreign spouse visa were a mail-order bride (highly unlikely, but let’s just assume it to be true), m.o.b.’s would account for about one-half of one percent of all marriages taking place in the country.
October 23rd, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Petey,
Actually, I would blame Roe v. Wade for the decay in relationship longevity in modern USA, and the dysfunctional nature of modern sexuality in a place like New York City, where three of four pregnancies are aborted.
It used to be that when looking for a partner, men and women would look for those qualities that suggested that someone would be a good mother or father. This was not completely done away with by the advent of birth control, since birth control is never foolproof and it was always possible that a child would be the eventual result. Nowadays, sex has been completely seperated from procreation, thanks to the machinations of Jarvis-Thompson and her ilk. Men and women no longer look for good character in a partner, rather they are free to seek out bad boys and bad girls respectively. The resulting sexual free for all, just like the capitalist economic free for all, has been good for a few scoundrels and cads, and bad for everyone else.
Sociobiology tells us exactly what we should expect when the last and most intimate link between pregnancy and childbirth has broken down: the dysfunctional dissolution of fidelity, love, and eventually society itself.
October 23rd, 2008 at 3:20 pm
Re: There is no world where ‘beta’ men are going to be hooking up with hot women.
Actually, some of the most attractive of my female friends are married/in long term relationships with very average looking guys. You see, there are some women out there, and some men, who have not bought into Jarvis-Thompson’s culture of death arguments, and still see character and personal virtue as more attractive than the bad-boy scoundrel type.
October 23rd, 2008 at 4:06 pm
Obviously older men are dating younger women.
October 23rd, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Hector, it’s bad form to toss out someone relatively obscure like Jarvis-Thompson like that. She’s eminently Googleable (though the Wikipedia entry is astoundingly weak), but deliberate obscurantism isn’t exactly the way to get your point across. Remember, you know what you mean by “culture of death,” but the typical reader of this blog will not. Or have you stopped caring about that? Honestly, sometimes I don’t know what you think you’re proving.
Incidentally, you seem to be maligning New York somewhat. People I know who have tried the sex and dating scenes in other places are stunned at how relatively chaste New York is compared to, say, LA, Boston, or (especially) San Francisco. Though all of those places may be so far away from your standards that the distinction is irrelevant.
And sociobiology doesn’t tell us any such thing; you really haven’t been paying attention. The point of a sociobiological argument is that you can’t remake human behavior because it’s hardwired; even if sex and procreation are 100% disconnected, people will still behave as if they were connected because those behaviors have been set by evolution. People have made the argument you’re making, but those people aren’t sociobiologists.
October 23rd, 2008 at 5:49 pm
“Actually, I would blame Roe v. Wade for the decay in relationship longevity in modern USA, and the dysfunctional nature of modern sexuality in a place like New York City”
Your bad is my good, Hector…
October 23rd, 2008 at 5:50 pm
Re: And I seriously doubt there is a cabal of ‘alpha’ men hooking up with a much larger group of hot women who are then excluded from dating the remaining pool of men.
And I also seriously doubt there are that many more alpha women than alpha men.
Re: Actually, I would blame Roe v. Wade for the decay in relationship longevity in modern USA
Hector: Roe vs Wade was in the 70s (1973?)? The divorce tsunami was already gathering steam a generation before that.
Re: It used to be that when looking for a partner, men and women would look for those qualities that suggested that someone would be a good mother or father.
I don’t disagree, but I would like to point out that the same qualities that make a person a good parent also make them a good spouse. So the question is why so many people don’t even bother looking for someone who will be good for the longer haul? To some extent that’s always been true– an aunt of mine made a disastrous marriage with a petty (but very attractive) crook back in the 30s. But in the past families were much more involved with their children’s choice of partners. I think that may be the big difference now.
Re: The point of a sociobiological argument is that you can’t remake human behavior because it’s hardwired
A gross over-statement. And statements like this are the reason sociobiology is not widely accepted. Apart from simple reflexes, human behavior is never hardwired. Individuals can and do act in ways opposite from what strict Darwinism would predict. At most, our genes give us a small push in a given direction; whether we continue in the direction of that push is determined by a plethora of other factors.
October 23rd, 2008 at 6:20 pm
AlanC9,
The wikipedia page about Jarvis Thomson says that her famous paper is arguably the most cited philosophy paper in recent years. Hardly an obscure figure. The ‘culture of death’ was a favorite phrase of the last Pope, who was also a rather well-known figure.
October 23rd, 2008 at 6:22 pm
JonF,
That’s true about the divorce rate. However, Akerlof and others have argued that legal abortion gave extra death-blow to an already collapsing marriage rate, particularly in inner city communities, by removing the reason for the shotgun marriage.
October 23rd, 2008 at 6:57 pm
It seems the convo here has taken a terrible turn. Nonetheless, I wanted to ask about what single means. Because you imply it means unmarried at first, and then categorize it under dating. So are single people in unmarried relationships, or are they all those that are not married, dating or otherwise?
October 23rd, 2008 at 7:11 pm
I’ve lived in several American cities. For the last five and a half years I lived in Manhattan. I’m now in my early 30’s. I slept with over a hundred women in those 5.5 years. It wasn’t hard. There’s no question that a guy can be easily in promiscuous in NYC; especially if he’s at all good-looking. So were a minority of us dudes getting most of the play? I suppose. Never really looked at it that way, but it was certainly easy enough to be sleeping with/dating multiple women simultaneously. One factor might just have been that NY professionals have such busy schedules that it’s normal to only see someone you’re dating once or twice a week. Which means that you can easily have 3 or 4 girlfriends (so long as they live in different neighborhoods).
October 23rd, 2008 at 8:25 pm
Notgivingmyname,
Do you seriously expect us to endorse that sort of behavior?
Re: Never really looked at it that way, but it was certainly easy enough to be sleeping with/dating multiple women simultaneously.
Easy enough if you’re a cad and a scoundrel, I suppose. Did you ever pause to consider the feelings of the women you used for sex?
October 23rd, 2008 at 9:33 pm
@Hector – don’t get your boxers in a bunch. Who’s to say the 3-4 women he’s dating don’t have 3-4 guys they’re seeing, too?
October 23rd, 2008 at 9:45 pm
Male immigrant laborers.
October 24th, 2008 at 12:11 am
CParis,
Great, like that makes it better.
October 24th, 2008 at 12:58 am
I’d prefer to see a chart indicating where all the losers are vs where the guys are that are sleeping with a hundred women in five years.
I’m in there, somewhere.
None of that crap matters, anyway. You have to be a PUA (Pick Up Artist) to change your odds. That or rich or a celebrity – preferably a rich celebrity Pick Up Artist.
The important thing is that you can LEARN to be a PUA. The other two options involve a lot of luck (and possibly some equally hard work and smarts as learning to be a PUA).
October 24th, 2008 at 11:45 am
@Hector – what’s wrong with a single man or woman enjoying sex for fun? Or are you one of those procreation-only people?
October 24th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
I’m a woman living in Kansas City – and I can tell you that those statistics LIE.
Sure, there may be more men here, but how many of them aren’t hooked on meth? alcoholics? living with mom ’cause they just can’t find a job “worthy of their talents”?
Very few are emotionally mature. And ALL of them are searching for a “Barbie” kind of doll – in the midwest, yet. LOL
October 25th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
One bright spot is Asheville, NC, and Tallahassee of course but I’d rather go to someplace like Asheville. A lot of college-age singles there, I hear. I go to school in Ohio, a small liberal arts college in the northeast. Nearly everyone is paired up. It’s pretty depressing, if you ask me.
October 25th, 2008 at 7:41 pm
Heh. No wonder it’s a sausage fest over here.
October 25th, 2008 at 10:31 pm
Clearly young men just need to start hooking up with grandmas.
October 26th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
Several thoughts. Mostly irrelevant.
1. As an “Angry nerd”, what bugged me wasn’t necessarily that hot girls date alpha males, it’s when they’d date them, be “shocked, shocked” that they turn out to be assholes, complain to their nice, single guy friends that they can’t find a nice guy to date, then go out and find a new asshole that treats her like shit. Not that all girls are like that, but there’s enough of them to make the nerds feel pretty burned. (You can also blame the nerds for being friends with girls like that).
2. That said, as a sometimes “angry nerd” myself (though I prefer to say “bitter”), I have and have had several good relationships with some pretty hot girls. If you cultivate some interests other than anime and Dungeons and Dragons, learn to sell yourself on OkCupid and invest in some deodorant for the first date… you’ll eventually do alright in the dating scene.
3. De facto polygamy isn’t the case in my experience, but de facto polyamory seems to be increasingly so. “Serial monogamy” seems to have given away to just a general non-monogamy, where you can’t assume that you’re in an “exclusive relationship” unless it’s explicitly stated. I know more and more girls who might have one or more guys they refer to as “fuck buddies”. This still favors the alpha males though.
4. It’s worth noting that true adulthood keeps being pushed later and later. We graduate college at 22 (at the earliest), live with our parents or roommated until our mid 20’s, and enjoy being single till our late 20’s. Till then we’re still playing the field so to speak – marriage doesn’t factor into our thoughts till 26, 27, or even early 30’s. And on the flip side, I know lots of couples who “cohabitate” and are married in all but name, but haven’t for whatever reason. In both cases, this is a stark difference from the days of my grandparents, who graduated high school, got married, moved out, had a job that rendered them financially independent and had their first kid at 20.
5. The other difference is that back then people married out of social obligation and/or economic necessity. Happiness might have been a lucky side effect, but it certainly wasn’t the reason to be doing it. By contrast, everyone under 30 today expects to find happiness with whoever they eventually decide to marry. Do you know anyone who’s figured out what makes them happy? Me neither. Which probably explains why that generation was generally happier in their marriages over the long term – different expectations.
January 15th, 2009 at 1:35 am
Birth patterns produce 107:100 male to female births (this can vary somewhat but it’s basically right), but men live longer. Basically there is a shortage of women in the young reproductive age group and a shortage of men in older geriatric groups. Since women choose to be with men an average of 5 years older the numbers crunch in the “young” age groups is magnified.
Isn’t if funny how all young women complain about some supposed man shortage? Despite demographics massively favoring women they still act like victims. Go figure.
Some people seem to think male homosexuality is a factor. That might have been true once but according to a recent Reuter’s article a very large percentage of young women are reporting they are lesbians, another report I’ve seen indicates that 14% of young women are reporting homosexual contact with other women and that they are probably lesbian or bisexual. There is no correlating increase in homosexuality in men. This is a recent phenomenen that has correlated with the commodification of female homosexuality in the media. Talk shows, music groups (like TATU or Indigo girls), sitcoms etc… have been targeting underage girls with these messages for quite some time now. Clearly they aren’t as born that way as they claim. You guys may be titilated by lesbianism and maybe even encouraged your girlfriends to try it out but the consequence is that they like it better than sex with you and now you’ve lost a potential partner.
In my opinion the worst place to meet women is portland OR. Anyone listen to Tom Leykis? He knows about Portland, he derisively calls it Porkland and regularly refers to the low quality and quantity of single young women there. He’s absolutely right. I’ve lived in Portland most of my life and it’s the biggest **ckfest I’ve ever seen. I don’t care what any statistics say, actual experience tells you more what’s going on than anything else. Try checking out the Portland single scene for a while, you won’t find a big city with less nice looking women and more swinging **cks than Portland in a dating scene. It’s a nightmare. Problem is Portland is a big turn off to hot chicks, they hate rain and small town atmospheres, guys love the recreation and don’t mind the rainy overcast weather. The population has doubled in the last 20 years, with many more young single guys than young single women moving here…you get the picture. Not to mention the aforementioned lesbians. I’ve gone out many nights and seen more lesbians than single straight women. That’s insult on top of injury.
If you are a guy that want to be in a place with a good supply of young women, don’t worry about stats, look for sunny weather close to beaches, college towns (more women than men go to college, plus these are women that didn’t get married or pregnant at a young age), areas that have an industry that employs a high percentage of women. Might take some research and some traveling but if it means the difference between getting laid on a regular basis or sitting around alone then it’s worth it.
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