Scan barcode
A review by jasonfurman
Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It by Richard V. Reeves
5.0
A spectacular book that synthesizes a range of research in economics, education, psychology, sociology, evolutionary biology and public policy in order to document, explain and propose remedies to the problems facing boys and men in modern society.
Richard Reeves does not set out to gratuitously shock with a polemic He is at pains to say nothing in his book is about diminishing challenges facing women and girls. He works hard to bring both progressives and conservatives along with a sympathetic account of how their approaches could contribute—while also criticizing the errors they made. Nevertheless, the book is truly shocking.
Yes, I knew many of the main points: girls are increasingly successful in school and a growing majority in higher education. Male employment rates have been falling for decades (in fact, Reeves draws on some work we did at the Council of Economic Advisers on this topic). Men are increasingly lonely and often feeling without purpose. All of this is especially bad for Black men and poor men. Most randomized trials and natural experiments find that most public policies that help girls do not also help boys (e.g., preschool, mentoring, college scholarships, work subsidies, training, etc.) But I learned a number of new ones and reading them all together in such stark terms was still eye opening.
Reeves then goes on to explain these points, grounding his explanation in a combination of nature and nurture. He explains some of the evolutionary biology of masculinity and the way in which it co-developed with culture. The evidence is overwhelming that there is something different about men including risk taking (possibly the biological result of their lower rates of evolutionary success), violence, sexual drive, and more. Reeves notes that there is a lot of overlap between men and women on most of these but that men also have greater variance and thus more extremes.
This account allows Reeves to situate his analysis in a political context. He chides progressives for alienating men with their belief that all masculinity is toxic and their mistaken insistence on a “blank slate” that denies the role of biology. Conservatives have the opposite problem, over-emphasizing biology and treating feminism as itself toxic. Much of the conservative response styles itself as a response to the liberal one, in which discussions of male problems are de-emphasized so it becomes a forbidden discussion that quickly turns dark and ugly.
Finally, Reeves concludes with a set of very detailed and specific policy recommendations. The biggest one is to redshirt boys, setting the default of starting school a year later to make up for their slower biological development. This is a big idea and deserves serious thought—but I’m not sure the evidence is good enough yet that I would want to see the entire country adopt it. More modest is the suggestion of an effort to enlist more male teachers, something the evidence shows matters a lot for boys learning reading—and now only 11 percent of elementary school teachers are male. In addition he has ideas on attracting more men to HEAL professions, non-transferrable paid leave that could be used for children up to age 18, and much more.
Overall the problem Reeves is documenting is not exactly a secret, after all he cites and draws heavily on work by leading economists, sociologists, and other social scientists and biologists who have all done scholarship in the area. Then again, you wouldn’t read a book on inequality and dismiss it because it is not a newly discovered problem. Reeves puts it together nicely, tying together all of the different steps of the argument and aspects of the problem. He also shows how much it was neglected in public policy discussions (e.g., he highlights several examples of a focus on a problem for girls/men when the exact same problem, like suicide or COVID or whatever, is worse for boys/men). I don’t think he has all the solutions—no one person does—but I hope the book motivates more people to look for them.
Richard Reeves does not set out to gratuitously shock with a polemic He is at pains to say nothing in his book is about diminishing challenges facing women and girls. He works hard to bring both progressives and conservatives along with a sympathetic account of how their approaches could contribute—while also criticizing the errors they made. Nevertheless, the book is truly shocking.
Yes, I knew many of the main points: girls are increasingly successful in school and a growing majority in higher education. Male employment rates have been falling for decades (in fact, Reeves draws on some work we did at the Council of Economic Advisers on this topic). Men are increasingly lonely and often feeling without purpose. All of this is especially bad for Black men and poor men. Most randomized trials and natural experiments find that most public policies that help girls do not also help boys (e.g., preschool, mentoring, college scholarships, work subsidies, training, etc.) But I learned a number of new ones and reading them all together in such stark terms was still eye opening.
Reeves then goes on to explain these points, grounding his explanation in a combination of nature and nurture. He explains some of the evolutionary biology of masculinity and the way in which it co-developed with culture. The evidence is overwhelming that there is something different about men including risk taking (possibly the biological result of their lower rates of evolutionary success), violence, sexual drive, and more. Reeves notes that there is a lot of overlap between men and women on most of these but that men also have greater variance and thus more extremes.
This account allows Reeves to situate his analysis in a political context. He chides progressives for alienating men with their belief that all masculinity is toxic and their mistaken insistence on a “blank slate” that denies the role of biology. Conservatives have the opposite problem, over-emphasizing biology and treating feminism as itself toxic. Much of the conservative response styles itself as a response to the liberal one, in which discussions of male problems are de-emphasized so it becomes a forbidden discussion that quickly turns dark and ugly.
Finally, Reeves concludes with a set of very detailed and specific policy recommendations. The biggest one is to redshirt boys, setting the default of starting school a year later to make up for their slower biological development. This is a big idea and deserves serious thought—but I’m not sure the evidence is good enough yet that I would want to see the entire country adopt it. More modest is the suggestion of an effort to enlist more male teachers, something the evidence shows matters a lot for boys learning reading—and now only 11 percent of elementary school teachers are male. In addition he has ideas on attracting more men to HEAL professions, non-transferrable paid leave that could be used for children up to age 18, and much more.
Overall the problem Reeves is documenting is not exactly a secret, after all he cites and draws heavily on work by leading economists, sociologists, and other social scientists and biologists who have all done scholarship in the area. Then again, you wouldn’t read a book on inequality and dismiss it because it is not a newly discovered problem. Reeves puts it together nicely, tying together all of the different steps of the argument and aspects of the problem. He also shows how much it was neglected in public policy discussions (e.g., he highlights several examples of a focus on a problem for girls/men when the exact same problem, like suicide or COVID or whatever, is worse for boys/men). I don’t think he has all the solutions—no one person does—but I hope the book motivates more people to look for them.