Partnership Report: Three Books on Marriage

Marriage seems to be having a moment. In “The Two-Parent Privilege,” Melissa S. Kearney describes how marriage helps children flourish. Brad Wilcox implores adults in a forthcoming polemic, “Get Married,” to find happiness and security the old-fashioned way. A critic in New York magazine bemoans the “marital revivalism” of such wedlock proponents, while, online, arguments rage over the practical value of marriage to the individual: Are women happier single or as wives? Why should men even bother to marry, given the calculus of risks versus rewards?