New CSJ report on the importance of marriage to children’s outcomes is a masterclass in getting LOTS of coverage for a report in which a big conclusion rests on a small amount of not-very conclusive evidence. https://twitter.com/csjthinktank/status/1294876543710240768

The report claims to consider one of the big problems with the assertion that marriage improves children’s life-chances (“whether marriage produces stability or if stability produces marriage”) BUT...

...appears to think that saying “there are reasons to think that there is a causal element [ie that marriage causes family stability not vice-versa] in the public and intentional commitment of a marriage” has solved said problem...

...Whereas (for example) evidence that goes unmentioned by the CSJ report - summarised in un-paywalled form here: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/07/why-are-so-many-millennials-having-children-out-of-wedlock/491753/ - suggests the relationship is more vice-versa (and is based on rather more robust & numerous data than “reasons to think”).

This isn’t to say marriage isn’t a positive force in family stability, but the evidence doesn’t allow us to say so, and especially not to say so with the confidence that CSJ so frequently do...

This matters, because the sort of coverage CSJ have secured for their report can divert political energy & funding from potential initiatives for which there is far stronger evidence of power to improve our children’s life-chances.

TBH, if you’re publishing papers with the power to influence our children’s lives that are more strongly guided by your dogma than the evidence (See also here https://www.ft.com/content/12400596-16ac-11df-aa09-00144feab49a) you might want to reflect on your moral code.

Speaking of morals & ethics, the CSJ’s dogma-led report has generated abhorrent headlines like the one pictured