Skip to content
Juneteenth 2025: Honoring Freedom, Advancing Justice, and Celebrating Black Futures with CSSH
Apply
Stories

College enrollment among men is down. What does that mean for modern dating?

People in this story

Photo by Adam Glanzman/Northeastern University
Danielle Nguyen, CISÕ19 and Niousha Jafari, CISÕ19, of NU Hacks work on a laptop in ISEC on May 9, 2017.

By now it’s no secret: college enrollment is down, and it’s way down among men. In fact, the gender gap is the widest it’s ever been in the history of higher education, with women making up roughly 60% of college students in the U.S. The gulf represents a decades-long trend that is showing no signs of letting up. Fewer men earning college degrees than their female counterparts has become a vexing problem with wide-ranging socioeconomic implications, several Northeastern experts say. 

“Higher female college-going makes sense,” says Mindy Marks, associate professor of economics at Northeastern. “The returns from a college degree have gone up, so the earning’s difference, for both genders, between what you can earn with a college degree versus not, has risen over time.” It’s “Economics 101,” whose research includes the relationship between academic time investment and future earnings. “Women do exactly what the model predicts,” she says. “Really the puzzle isn’t about women, it’s about men.” Its impacts can be felt not only in the workforce, where women are still lagging behind men but are projected to eclipse them, but in the dating and marriage markets, Marks says.

Continue reading at News@Northeastern.

More Stories

The value of the dollar bill, pictured on Friday, May 23, 2025, is depreciated. Photo by Alyssa Stone/Northeastern University

The value of the dollar is dropping. What does that mean for Americans and the world?

05.30.2025
Drones have become a game-changer in the Russia-Ukraine War, says Mai’a Cross, a professor of political science at Northeastern. Photo by Roman Chop/Global Images Ukraine via Getty Images

How cheap combat drones could turn Ukraine into a ‘defense powerhouse’ in Europe

05.29.2025
Generation Z is the first generation in several decades to not lose their religious affiliation as they age. (Photo by Edward Berthelot/Getty Images)

Why is Gen Z more religious than previous generations?

06.10.25
All Stories