withdrawal andre couldn't get back on the ship. he had to go by land which greatly complainted. he was within a few miles of being back there. and they -- within days a giant british fleet was going up the way. . .

>> had occurred, it would have been successful. >> do you think that arnold felt that if, um, the attack, the planned attack had failed, that he would still be, um, safe, that he would be undiscovered at this point? >> my guess is that once the attack started, he and peggy and the baby would have gotten in the barge and headed for manhattan for safety, whether or not the attack succeeded. >> part of the deal and the big sticking point over this more than a year period of negotiations was how much he was going to get paid if it failed. they'd all agreed it was going to be 200, i mean, 20,000 pounds if it succeeded, but they were dickering over whether he'd get a guaranteed 10,000 pounds if it failed which the british didn't like, but he wanted. >> what he'd end up getting, sick? >> he ended up getting six which is a lot back then. >> thank you.

>> thanks so much. >> well, thank you both so much. [applause] >> coming up this afternoon on booktv, "after words" with liez si mundy. she discusses her book, "the richer sex." then stanley weintraub recounts the 1944 wartime presidential campaign. and after that, david stewart or "american emperor" about the political career of america's third vice president, aaron burr, and his famous duel with alexander hamilton. >> all this week booktv is on c-span2 with your favorite book programs throughout the day. our in depth programs originally airing live the first sunday of every month feature a comprehensive three-hour look into an author's look with questions from viewers by phone calls, e-mails and tweets. this sunday, historian michael beschloss, author and co-author of almost a dozen books

including his latest, "jacqueline kennedy." join us live this sunday at noon eastern with michael beschloss on c-span2's booktv. >> up next, booktv presents "after words," an hourlong program where e invite guest hosts to interview authors. liez sa mundy discusses her book, "the richer success." more men are looking at marriage as a means of economic stability or staying home with the children, choices previously reserved for women. the former washington post reporter discusses the long-term implications of this and other economy-related role reversals with april ryan, american urban radio white house correspondent. >> host: liza mundy, you have written a very fascinating book. it's a read, i think, that needs to be put on the book shelves of stores as well as homes for men

and women. we're talking about breadwinners, the socioeconomic shift that's happened. and just in reading this book i saw something that said that in the 1970s the single digits for women to run the household, to be the breadwinner. and now it's over 40%, i believe? >> guest: right. >> host: of women in this nation who are running households. talk to me about the good news about that and why it happened. >> guest: well, just as you say, it used to be in the single digits, now almost 40% of working wives outearn their husbands, and there are a number of different reasons why. one is that women are becoming more educated. we know now that 57% of college and university students are women in this country, and they're starting to see an economic payoff to those degrees. we also know that young women under 30 in most american cities outearn their male peer group, and that is a direct result of their education. so those are the positive reasons why women's earnings are

rising. the maybe sort of less positive reasons are for men, are changes in the economy that were illuminated by the recession. we're seeing the waning, the disappearance of the sort of high-paying industrial jobs for high school graduates that used to be plentiful for men. we know those are going away, we know that we're moving into a knowledge economy that fields like health care are expanding that are traditionally women's fields. right. so we're seeing women improving their training, their education, their professional preparation, and women are preparing for this new economy in a way that men have not quite adjusted to yet. so that's one of the reasons that we're seeing this rise in women's earnings relative to men's. >> host: you know, we've heard things about submission, you know, most recently with michele bachmann answering that question about how she would handle her husband's decision making as a president, as a then-presidential candidate. but talk to me about this shift. how did this shift happen?

because submission plays along with religion, and it plays along with stereotypes of that nature and stigmas as well. >> guest: right. >> host: does this all come because of women's rights or because of necessity? >> guest: well, it came in part with campuses opening up to women that hadn't been open to women, with workplaces. i mean, there's still a gender age gap overall, there's still discrimination in the workplace, but things have gotten better. women have moved into fields like law and medicine. there are fields that have flipped like psychology, veterinary medicine, there are fields becoming all female that used to be all male. there still aren't enough women in corporate boardrooms or politics, but there are sectors of the economy where women have made significant inroads. but you talk about, i'd like to believe and i do believe that overall this is a good thing for women, that it's good to be economically empowered in your relationships. you know, let it not be forgotten that 150 years ago women could not own property in

marriage or own the right to their own wages. um, that, you know, that -- and the idea was that this was the way that the husband's dominance was enforced. i mean, i have a quote from the london times in 1868 when there was a discussion about giving women property rights in marriage, and the times just wrote a thunderous editorial about why this would be a mistake, that marriage would be destroyed, the fabric of society would be destroyed, that marriage consisted of authority on the one side and subordination on the other and that this was the way in which women were kept subordinate, and they wrote: if a woman were to have her own earnings she could use in marriage, what would prevent her from going where she likes and doing what she pleases? and that wasn't an ironic, you know, they weren't joking. they were quite serious. and even once women did get property rights in marriage, the idea that a woman would be an unpleasant wife if she was an economically independent wife

really persisted. and you see social commentators in the 1920s saying if a woman has her own earnings in marriage, she becomes a more critical wife and less lenient to her husband's failings, and the work force really enforced this. there was a two-tier wage system, we still see the vestiges of this. but men were the breadwinners, and can they were paid more because they were the breadwinners. ultimately, it is a good thing for women to have more economic empowerment in our relationships, but i would also agree with you that that traditional religions, traditional communities, the idea, the idea of women's sub ord or nation in marriage -- subordination in marriage still persists, and there are still congregations where you would hear the wife should be submissive, just as you say michele bachmann had to talk herself out of this because she had described herself as a submissive wife. and she said the reason i became a tax lawyer, and i hate taxes,

it was because i was directed, my husband wanted me to be a tax lawyer, so i was submissive that way. and what you do see sometimes when women become the breadwinner in a traditional community or a traditional religion, the sort of loophole that people will fall back on is this idea, well, i'm going out and earning because my husband is directing me to be the earner, because we've decided this is the way it's going to work in our marriage. it's kind of having your cake and eating it too. but i do think in general it contributes to a sense of stigma and a sense of this is wrong, that this is wrong for the woman to be the earner, and there's something -- and it makes, i mean, it creates tension in marriages and problems for people, ultimately, to be taught this, um, and sometimes in-laws, you know, extended families can reinforce this message that there's something wrong with the relationship. and it makes it hard. >> host: interestingly enough, in a time when we are just bombarded by social media, we are people who just don't talk.

and in this book i found that there was comfort in other people's experiences. you have extensively talked to people, japan, the u.k., here in the united states. we were just talking about religion. someone of the mormon faith in talking about how she has to give up her sunday school class because she is the breadwinner of her family. and it's just really interesting to see that and how the shift has changed in some families. and talk to me specifically about minority families that you've talked to because, um, there is a different dynamic to a certain extent in minority families. >> guest: right. african-american families, women traditionally in the african-american community have been better educated than men. back in the '50s and 'of 60s, there was an economic pay off to a college degree in the sense that the jobs available to women were largely domestic jobs or low-paying factory jobs. you could be a teacher or a nurse or something.

but for a man, you weren't going to get an economic payoff in the white collar workplace if you were a black man in the 1950s or '60s, so there wasn't that incentive to go to college. but there were higher-paying industrial jobs available for men in the '50s, '60s and '70s. now, those jobs, as we've just cutsed, are wane -- discussed, are waning. so it's much more likely for a woman to be the breadwinner than it is in the nation, even more likely. and this can create tensions. there's more religion, there's more religious belief, and that's a wonderful thing, obviously, but it can create tensions. also in the latino community which, um, i mean, this disparity gets less attention, but latino women are outachieving men academically at an even higher rate than the national rate x. so i spent a lot of time in deep south texas in a community of latino women talking to them, and they were all college graduates. the men in their community are much less likely to be college

graduates. talking to them about the impact that this has on their relationships. because there's, you know, this is still, there's still a fair amount of ma cheese mow, that the man should be the provider. and in some couples, um, you know, it was working out okay, but there's a lot of single motherhood down there. and i was talking to women lawyers and women teachers and psychologists saying, you know, we just go out together all the time. we go out dancing, and we have a good time together, us women. because the men don't approach us. the men don't come up to us. and so i interviewed another young woman who is a social worker, and her husband, her ex-husband -- [laughter] was also, um, involve inside social work. and her sali was -- salary was always a little bit above his. and he told her, i always felt like you were one step ahead of me, like you were pulling me along in my career, and he ultimately couldn't take it, you know, and he left her for another woman who was -- >> host: in the office. >> guest: yeah. but who was a trainee so he

could feel -- >> host: power. >> guest: right, right. >> host: wow. but, i mean, a traditional mindset that we had many years ago, a mother and father in the home and then, you know, the father was the breadwinner. and now that has just totally flipped, and so many people are trying to understand how to keep a husband, how to keep a relationship and try to also still have their cake and eat it too, be in the boardroom, be a congresswoman, be whatever, you know? be the head of a business. >> guest: right, right. >> host: how do you do that? >> guest: that's a really good question, and i did interview a lot of couples where the men felt that they had a sense of freedom to, um, to not just have to be a provider, i mean, to not be yoked to a job that they disliked where men felt like they were empowered to spend more time with their children. some of the ingredients for that, women have a tendency when they are the breadwinners to retain control over their earnings. and we know, for example, that in the households where a woman's the breadwinner, she's

more likely to make the financial and the purchasing decisions than in a house where the man is the breadwinner. and i think it's because women have been raised to think of our earnings as our spending money, our shoe money, whatever, and not really to think of it so much as the household's -- >> host: paying the mortgage, paying child care. >> guest: yeah. so the successful couples, and they definitely exist, are where the woman has handed over her earnings to a certain point to her husband. and they talk about it together. she's not treating these earnings as my earnings, she's treating them as our earnings, and she's empowering him to make decisions along with her. and also i think, um, couples where, actually, often the man will have another realm in which his masculinity can be recovered. for example, a lot of hunting in couples. [laughter] a lot of playing golf. and also i think, um, a lot of protecting. i mean, there are different aspects of masculinity. providing is just one of what, you know, one quality that we

have associated with masculinity, but protection matters also. >> host: in the religious committee they call it covering, women just want someone there for security, you know, if someone comes in, you know, he's here to protect me, and he's just there for me. >> guest: right. and i talked to one woman, he carries my suitcase, you know? he puts my coat on, he opens the doors for me. i talked to one young woman who likes to have her boyfriend drive her car. i think there are ways in which you recover this sense that you're being protected, and i think many women do want to feel that. and i think, also, one wife that i talked to, a very successful executive in the auto industry with a very happy husband who's a secondary earner, she had really expanded her idea of what it means to provide. and she said, you know, yes, i provide the earnings, but he provides for our family in the sense that he's doing the cooking, he's running the household, he's coaching our kids and turning them into really good golfers, you know,

get some college scholarships -- she didn't say that, but i was thinking that -- and, you know, preparing our children for adulthood. and that's providing too. providing isn't just providing earnings. that if you think of yourself as a family and if you think of o yourself as a team, and she said, you know, when i get a raise at work, he's so proud of me, and it's like we got a raise, our family got a raise. but i really felt as though she had redefined providing to include what her husband does and she had a lot of respect for what her husband was doing. >> host: and as women are going into the workplace and finding so manifferent ways to be the breadwinner or manager or supervisor or just standout person in that company, they are bringing more money home -- as your book shows -- they're bringing more money home than their husbands. now, in your week -- book it surprised me when i saw men should, men should see this and hitch their wagon to that star.

>> guest: right. right. >> host: talk to me about that. why should a man feel like they need to hitch their wagon to a star, this woman who ease rising -- who ease rising and becoming the breadwinner when, indeed, tradition shows us we should hitch our wagon to his star because he's getting ready to do or that? >> guest: well, hopefully, there'd be a lot of mutual hitching. >> host: i like that. [laughter] >> guest: what you see is, you know, younger women today are in an interesting position, women in their 20s, because they are better educated by and large than men in their 20s. there are not enough college-educated men for every college-educated young woman to marry, so women are having to ask themselves would i marry a man who doesn't have the level of education that i do? and you -- >> host: you say a lot of women marry down. >> guest: right. quote-unquote, marry down. and men increasingly have gotten the message that earnings and education are desirable in the life partner and that earnings are a good thing. and when men respond to surveys

and sort of rank traits that they consider desirable in a partner, um, domestic skills have plummeted. men don't care about domestic skills anymore, but they do care about financial prospects. and you see more and more studies showing that marriage rates for higher-income women are actually rising. and i do think it's a good thing if men are willing to facilitate their wife's career and maybe move for her career because this is something husbands have not traditionally been willing to do for wives. and it has disadvantaged women in the workplace because if the boss is thinking about a woman for a promotion but she'd have to move, they think, oh, her family would never move for her, so i'm not going to offer it. but if workplaces get the message that men will support and compromise for a woman's career, i mean, in that sense hitch their wagon. i talked to young women whose boyfriends had said to them you've got it going on. i mean, you've got the better

earning potential in our relationship, and so i'll move across the country for you. and, for example, i interviewed a young woman law student. she was in law school in vermont, came from a working class family, had married her high school sweetheart, he had trained as a carpenter. he was working as an auto mechanic to put her through law school, so he was doing for her what wives have traditionally done for a husband, putting her through graduate school so she could increase her earning potential and ultimately be the primary earner. and this was something that made both of them happy. i mean, she was very happy at the end of the day to come home and not have to talk about law and deal with another law student, to deal with a man who was supportive. so, you know, he had hitched his wagon to her star, but she had hitched herself to someone who would be domestic and supportive. and in an ideal world, couples would be willing to do that for one another -- >> host: one another. >> guest: right. and they would make a decision about who at that moment seemed

to have the better potential and then make it possible for that person to actualize themselves, you know, to realize their potential. >> host: we're talking with liza mundy, liza mundy, the author of "the richer sex: how the new majority of female breadwinners is transforming sex, love and family." um, you celebrate the women in this book, but it's a reality. we've seen nancy pelosi talk about the marble ceiling. she, indeed, has set records and made strides herself. we've seen people like madeleine albright, we've seen george w. bush have condoleezza rice by his side. we've seen this president have hillary rodham clinton by his side. also his wife, the first lady, strong women. and he's even promoted, it's the first law, the first bill he signed into law was the lily ledbetter act for equal pay for women. >> guest: right. >> host: and this book comes at a time to show people that we have to really rethink how we're

doing things. when really was the catalyst for you to write this book? >> guest: i had been interested for a long time in the fact that women are outnumbering men in college because that was -- i have vivid memories of being in college in the 1980s, and women were in a minority on my campus. it was something like three to one male to female. and, um, and just wondering what had caused that slip. >> host: i love that. >> guest: right. [laughter] yeah, right. [laughter] what had caused that flip and what it was like for young women to be in the majority on campuses now, so different than what i had experienced. and then what life would be like for them going forward. and i was talking to my brilliant editor at simon simon& schuster who was really picking up on the earnings trend. she really saw more and more women in her life anecdotally, reading about it that -- really perceiving that something significant had changed. and we know that something significant has changed.

when you look at the table, the bureau of labor statistics actually keeps a table of wives who outearn their husbands which is kind of interesting why the government would even b track it. and i think they started it in the late 1980s because it was considered unusual. but when you look at it, it's going up and up. but what you see is in about 2000, 2001 it really starts shooting up, that percentage. which is interesting, it's before the recession. there was definitely an uptick in the recession, but it started happening before the recession. so a cultural shift, um, that was just increasingly becoming apparent. >> host: when we talk about women and their earning potential and their earnings, there is a potential for emasculation. how do we, from your book, find out how we prevent that? i mean, you talked about earlier that they have to be perceived as partners, and the couple has to be perceived as partners, and the women hand over to the man

the money, and he's the cfo of the family, but how in other ways can men not feel emasculated when the woman has the financial authority in the home to bring the money home, to give it to you? even in her conversation, how can men not feel emasculated? how does this book tell us that men should not be emasculated or prevent that from happening? >> guest: well, having a good sense of humor helps, i think. [laughter] i interviewed this one family in michigan that were so interesting to me, the hawkins family where they have six adult siblings. they were raised by a classic male breadwinner who was an engineer for ford. he didn't graduate from college because you didn't have to back in the '60s and '70s. raised six kids, his wife was a stay-at-home mom, and there's been a complete flip in that family in the sense that five of the six are in female-earner households, and three of them are heterosexual marriages where the husband has made a decision to be the secondary, to be the

secondary earner or in some cases a stay-at-home dad. and one of the great things about those men is they have great senses of humor. and really, you know, i asked one of them about this, about the idea of being emasculated. he said, you know, i thought about that a little bit. he had not brooded on it, he hadn't stewed over his masculinity. he said, you know, i think a lot of masculinity is really bravado. and really, you know, i think our idea of masculinity, i think, is much more flexible than we realize. and, you know, back in the 1950s look magazine was announcing the decline of the american male. so we always had the sense that masculinity's in crisis, you know? it's always under assault. but i think we can expand our notion and certainly men today, i think child care is a much more masculine activity than it used to be. it's okay to take care of kids now, it's okay to cook. when i was growing up, my dad did not cook. he cooks now all the time, but

it, like, wasn't acceptable. we didn't think it was masculine to cook. we know now that it's masculine to cook. i think sometimes men when they cook, cook with a lot of display. there's some sexual display going on. >> host: the outdoor grill. >> guest: yeah, whatever, if you need a blow torch, get the blow torch. but i think it's a more flexible definition. and a lot of men i talked to, they have another realm of life in which to feel -- really good golfers. these men in michigan are really good golfers. they go skiing with their friends, they go hiking with their wives. i think it doesn't have to be tied to earnings. and i would say, you know, their wives are really respectful of what they do. and it made me sometimes think that in, you know, when you look at feminism, we've spent so much time running away from the idea of being in aprons, you know, sort of running away from housework and thinking that housework is something that's,

you know, lesser, we don't want to do it. sometimes when husbands start or doing housework, i'm not really sure we're as appreciative as we should be, even though we want it. the idea that it's somehow lesser, maybe it's wrong. women need to change their mind about that. they need to find value in the man is helping around the house or being more supportive, taking care of the kids. women need to not discount that or treat it as less important work just because we've gravitated to the workplace. >> host: i found something interesting in the book, you said something about men needs to be complimented for the things that they do. >> guest: that's right. >> host: all sorts of things from the mundane to the large, but mostly the mundane. and i found that really interesting because that could, do you think that could play into the man thinking that he's -- a condescending kind of compliment? >> guest: well, yeah, if it's false. if you go around saying, you know, all the time, oh, and he's really a great photographer or,

you know, his family blog, it's going to be a book project. if you feel like you have to kind of -- he didn't lose his job, he decided to leave the workplace. if you have to make excuses, then yes. but to show appreciation for what the other person is doing is always, is always a good thing in a relationship. and also, i mean, getting back to the idea of protection, and this plays, i think, into women in politics as well. i was interviewing one very high-profile, best-selling author about how her husband reacted to her success, and he was very happy. let's not forget, men can be proud of their wives. they really can be, and i interviewed husbands who were very proud of their wives. so when her book became a bestseller, her husband was very proud of her and would go to events. and men sometimes won't. but he would go with her, and he became very protective in the sense if she was being kind of -- if too many people were coming up to her, he would sort

of come over and rescue her. and she said sometimes he rescued her a little sooner they she wanted to be, so they developed a hand signal. but that, to me, feels like old-fashioned protection and something she really valued. and you do see sometimes with women in politics, their male spouse has to find a role, right in and some of these husbands actually are fairly protective of their wives. if you're too protective, then it seems like she's beingty might -- diminished. but for women having somebody who's got your back in a public situation is probably something that's very welcome. >> host: in the minutes before our break, i want you to talk to me about what's happening in japan. that was very interesting, what's happening with the dynamic with men and women in japan. talk to me about -- >> guest: right. so i spent a summer in japan interviewing. this is a very traditional society where, you know, women have been the keepers of the household, men have been working these insane hours, you know, the japanese salary man. the man comes home, he does

nothing. there's a japanese word for husband that means big bag of trash. [laughter] that's the idea. he comes home, and the brief time that he's home, he doesn't do any help. and that's been the why -- way society has proceeded. women in japan are, you know, in about 30 years going to be the most educated human beings on the planet. demographers have projected this out. japan and south korea, women are going to be the most educated people globally. and that's, again, showing up in women's earnings. and there's been this radical decline in marriage in japan. people haven't been able to make that shift. but what's really interesting is that it has given rise to these commercialized -- there have always been marriage agencies, but there's this commercialized dating scene. two years ago there was something where you were trying to get men and women together for baseball outings or to make dim sum, finding ways to get people together to spend time. but when i talked to these agencies, they're actually trying to teach men how to talk to women.

literally teach them, like she would say, don't talk one-sidedly for a half an hour, okay? she gets bored. the idea that men have to bring something else to the table now besides their earnings, you know, you can't just be a big bag of trash in the living room anymore. [laughter] you've got to bring something else. and you've got to learn how to talk to women because you're not the salary man anymore. and so you've got to, something's going to have to change. and the government is even getting involved in these programs. now, in some cases also wives are being brought in from other countries like vietnam where women are still there's a little more of a traditional culture, women aren't quite as empowered or educated, so there's an importation of brides for men who aren't yet making this transition. so we're actually seeing a globalized marriage market as people are trying to get their heads around some of these, some of these changes. and, of course, the people in that sense who are losing out are the higher-end women because nobody's importing grooms for them.

>> host: wow. so tradition is really a woman's enemy in japan. >> guest: it is. it is, yes. yes. and, you know, if we don't adjust our thinking, then we could all go in that, in that direction. wow. you know, we're getting ready to take a break, and you've -- we've got some more to come, and it's some really good stuff. we're going to talk about, i guess, the bedroom. how the bedroom has changed. [laughter] and some of your favorite stories from this. and it's, again, we've talked about comfort in hearing other people's stories. this book is filled with so many stories from so many different people about how they've worked it out and some who have not worked it out. >> guest: right, right. >> host: it's real talk, real issues. we're talking with liza mundy. "the richer sex: how the new majority of female breadwinners is transforming sex, love and family." and we'll be back with liza mundy very soon.

we're back with liza mundy, the author of "the richer sex." and as i promised, we're going to talk about the bedroom, how this flip has worked or not worked in the bedroom. talk to me, liza. this is a very sensitive subject for a lot of people. >> guest: yeah, yeah. but i get asked this a lot, actually. >> host: really? >> guest: yeah. obviously, human beings are complicated, and it varies, and i would argue and i do argue that for young women being empowered, having your own earnings enables you to wait around. there's this idea that women used to trade any number of things in, you know, trade their sexual services for marriage, for provision. you know, or trade their domestic services. that marriage was a deal or a trade, and one of the things a woman was giving was her sexual service in order to be provided for. women don't have to do that anymore. so i would argue that for young women, you're looking very skeptical. [laughter] >> host: no. i'm just thinking about some things that you're saying. >> guest: i would argue that for young women it's good to be in a

position where you can wait around, where you can have maybe a number of sexual partners and find the right person for you or a man who's willing to chip in with housework which young women are very interested in. but in an existing relationship when a woman starts to pull ahead in a way that they had not anticipated, it can create problems, and it can even, it can even have to do with something like communication in the sense that if she is achieving and doing well but she comes home and she doesn't people like she can talk about it, she doesn't feel like she can talk about her success at work or the raise that she's gotten, and communication breaks down between the couple, then, obviously, intimacy is going to break down, and that's going to have a sexual consequence in a relationship because they're not talking to each other. if she doesn't feel she can talk honestly, or if he doesn't feel like he can talk about whatever reactions he mean having. and so -- he might be having. any couple when they're taken by

surprise about a situation and they don't feel like they can talk about it, that's going to cause a problem. but i did talk to women who found themselves with men who were particularly bothered by this. if the men have any self-esteem issues, we mentioned the couple in south texas where he left her for a woman who was more conventionally feminine, and he also became retaliatory in the sense that he would tell his wife that she was unattractive, she was earning, and he felt like she was ahead of him, and he would say you've gained weight, you're not attractive to me any more -- >> host: but even when they broke up, he was in the hallway telling her she wasn't this way or the other. >> guest: right. and i interviewed another woman in texas in i.t. who had acquired quite a substantial nest egg. she didn't want to have a family, but she wanted a companion. she found a guy who was gregarious and fun, and she thought, well, we'll have a great time together, i don't mind paying for the trips, we like to pay golf, i don't mind

paying to go to europe. but she found she couldn't talk about her successes. when she got a really great contract from work, if she came home, she couldn't talk about it. and she found that he was no longer attracted to her, but he was very attracted to other women. they would go into restaurants, and he would be flirting with the waitresses. and, ultimately, she found that he was interested in porn on his computer. and so a more conventional image of femininity. so it's a sad story except that you've got to assume that this guy probably wasn't a prince to be married to anyway, and she was -- one of the things they were arguing about was whether or not she should get a dog. she got the dog, and one day she had this epiphany, they were arguing about it, she said, you know what? i'll keep the dog and get rid of you. and so, i mean, the happy side of it is in a relationship that is unhappy for whatever reason, and relationships can be made unhappy for any number of

reasons -- >> host: that's true. >> guest: women can leave now. and, actually, economists call in the independence effect. and in a way the it's what the london times was afraid of when they said what is to prevent a woman from going where she likes and doing what she pleases if o? they were right. if a woman's in a relationship where it's unhappy, now it's easier for her to get a divorce, and i've interviewed plenty of women who made that decision. and it's not easy, it's painful, but it's better than being miserable in an unhappy relationship and feeling that you can't leave because you are impoverished. and interestingly, when we talk about one reason why young women are achieving and going to college, i talked to any number of young women and young men who had had mothers who were unhappy in their marriage and couldn't leave because they didn't have the education or didn't have the earnings or who did get a divorce but, um, but were impoverished after their divorce. and that's one of the things

that's driving women into college, is the feeling that i've got to be able to provide for myself. >> host: to reinvent yourself. >> guest: yeah. >> host: well, another thing you just touched on, breadwinning women are getting divorces and things of that nature, as you're saying, because sometimes they just don't want to take the outcome, some of the outcomes have become be it intimidation or turnoff or what have you or just bad situations. but you also say in the book that bread-winning women are more discerning and more willing to be alone. >> guest: yeah, yeah. >> host: than to partner with someone. >> guest: yes. look around at a restaurant and notice how many tables of women there are. marriage has declined in this country. more adults are living single, some of them are cohabiting. and interestingly, going back to that london times article, they said, you know, if a woman has earnings in the marriage, then the marriage just becomes an arrangement of cohabiting, independent agents. and, actually, we are seeing that.

we're seeing more cohabitation, but we are seeing women staying single. and i just interviewed someone in l.a., i was at a book event, and they came up to me afterwards, and these were really happy single women who just wanted to play golf and go out together. obviously, many women do eventually want to partner, but i think a single life is no longer a failed life for a woman. and i would imagine among your audience there are some obsessive watchers of dalton abbey. you know, the pbs show. all those girls had to look forward to in life was marriage. that was success, it was your only path -- >> host: women were taught, little girls were taught about the prince on the white horse that's going to come and sweep you off your feet and things of that nature. >> guest: right. still. >> host: that's what we're taught when we were kids, and i think you and i are close to the same age. when you get there sometimes it's like, okay, you have to wonder where is the white horse, where is the castle, where is the -- >> guest: right, right. yeah. we need to, we need to expand

our criteria, i think. [laughter] >> host: okay. >> guest: he doesn't have to be tall and rich and handsome anymore. he can be supportive. what's also interesting to me, though, is how adaptive we are, and that was, to me, one of the most interesting parts of reporting the book is the adaptations that people -- for example, young women who really think it's important to marry a man with a college education or a man with the same level or earnings. but they're in a city where there's a diminished market. they are jumping on airplanes, and they're going to other cities to expand their pool of potential mates. i interviewed this young woman down in miami, which is high among the cities where young women outearn young men, and she travels to new york off the time. she goes to san francisco, she goes to seattle, she goes to tallahassee because she's got the resources, she's got the airport close by. and that was, to me, travel was an interesting adaptation for young women who still, i guess, want the tall guy on the horse or whatever. [laughter] um, but also seeing women who

were expnding their -- padding -- expanding their criteria, who would move for them and help around the home. and also an interesting add adaptation i saw among latino women in texas was marrying men who didn't go to college and then making them go to college. or inspiring them to go to college. one very happy couple in south texas, you know, got married, high school sweethearts, she had an undergraduate degree and a bachelor's degree. he had neither because, in part because young men feel like they have to get out in the work force as soon as possible. they think of themselves as providers. so he had left college in order to take, you know, sort of a low-paying job. she had stayed in college and improved herself. but then she, she inspired him. she said, you know, you've got to get that degree, and i'll facilitate it, and i'll help you. and i hate statistics, and you hate it, but you'll get through it because we're a team. and so it was really interesting

seeing the -- we are, ultimately, very adaptive. and i think we will adapt to this, to this new situation. there are going to be some, there are going to be some transitional moments. >> host: and many. um, this book is about women, but you also talked to men. >> guest: uh-huh. >> host: let's talk about what the men are saying. let's really focus in on the men right now because we talked so much about the women -- >> guest: right. >> host: but the men are who we love, we stand by, we are with as well. >> guest: right. >> host: talk to me about the ones who are standing up with their women and accepting it be it because of job situations with them or this is what they chose when they walked in the door. talk to me about those who were intimidated or turned off by it. >> guest: right, right, right. okay. well, there's a whole variety. all those men are in the book. go back to the michigan husbands for a second who are so supportive of their wives. one of the things they said explicitly, one of them had dads who were breadwinners who were gone all the time.

and these men, and we know this is true of men, they want more time with their children. they're more domestically competent than we give them credit for. so these guys were very intent upon spending more time with their children than they dads had been able to spend with them. you know, love my dad, he's a great guy, but he wasn't around when i was growing up, and i want b to be around. so this situation for them enabled them to spend more time with their children, and they were very happy about that. and so i think that's one of the, one of the really positive outcomes for men in this situation and one of the reasons that these guys were very supportive, um, and perceived the benefits of not being yoked to being a provider. now, we also know that the recession really sort of illuminated the changes in the economy because, um -- >> host: it realigned a lot of households. >> guest: three-quarters of those who lost jobs in the recession were men. and and a lot for factory and construction jobs some of which

will come back, some of which won't. one of the things i think we don't give women credit for is a lot of women kept households afloat during the recession. wives and girlfriends. and this was not true, say, during the depression when women were pretty much not in the work force and not supposed to be in the work force. and i think one of the things that kept our recession from being a depression was the fact that we did have working and earning women who could keep the households afloat. because they were nurses. they were in the health care industry. they were teachers. they had jobs. or they were willing to take lower-paying jobs. so they were able to keep households afloat. we know that when men lose their jobs, they become more likely to leave a marriage. men in general are reluctant to leave marriages. they will hang in there longer than women will. but studies show that when they lose a job, when they can't be the provider, sometimes the psychological and emotional impact of that is so great that they leave, they leave the marriage. and so, obviously, it can be

enormously hard on men when they lose their jobs and that identity as a provide or is taken away from them. but studies have also shown during this recession that men were appreciative and grateful of wives and girlfriends who were keeping their households afloat. a sociologist last year interviewed some of these guys, and they said, you know, i'm really lucky to have her. and i got up early, and i made her coffee because she was the one who was going off to work. and i think that does suggest that there's been a mindset. you know, during the depression when women kept households afloat maybe they were taking in the boarders or whatever, they were not praised in their household. they were stigmatized, the working wives were. husbands felt devastated by the loss of their own jobs, but women were regarded as having taken a job from a man. but i think there is -- even though it's difficult, there is more gratitude and more appreciation and more acceptance by men who have lost their jobs in the recession of what their

wives or girlfriends are bringing to keep the household afloat. even though it is hard enough on them that it does make them more likely to leave a marriage than they ultimately would be. >> host: you touched on an important topic. some men felt that traditional role when they lost a job really affected them. they were not in that traditional role. and in reading the book, i saw things about retaliation. and some women have experienced that. >> guest: right. >> host: just talking to friends, i hear that quite a bit. >> guest: yeah, yeah. >> host: and i know a lot of men who have lost their jobs, and their wives are taking over the home financially and otherwise because they just can't find themselves. talk to me about the retaliatory measures. >> guest: right. as i said, for example, this young woman in texas whose husband started telling her she was physically unattractive, this is something women might here -- >> host: and they won't do housework either. they won't do anything. they'll sit at home and assume a

masculine role. >> guest: right. and i think, also, i interviewed one woman who really had sort of employed her boyfriend because he was well educated but not that successful professionally. and she had employed him, and that was ultimately, i think, problematic for them. it's not always problematic because there are wives out there who employ their husbands, and can it's fine. and she was running, she was -- well, she had been doing sort of a guardianship business, and he was helping her. but she was feeling that he was retaliating and not helping around the home. and so she started the spa, and she was working really, really hard to make the spa work. and one night she stayed out really late. she was having a spa party for like a wedding. and there were more people than she'd expected, she stayed up all night, she came home in the wee hours of the morning, and he, he was mad at her. and even though she was the breadwinner, and she said, you know, poor thing, she said what have i done to make you so

angry? and he really wouldn't tell her. but, obviously, the fact that she was -- i think it was the fact that she was gone. he said, well, you didn't call? she said, well, i was so tired, i climbed up in the manicure chair, and i went to sleep at 5:00 in the morning. so there was retaliation going on. actually, he took her car out, and he wrecked her car. i have to say there was more than one incident of wrecked vehicles or vehicles, you know, almost like retaliation against the personal property of the woman was something that i was told -- >> host: you'll have to spend that money that you're making to -- >> guest: yeah. yeah. i'm going to take your vehicle, but i'm not going to take care of it. and, again, i mean, you get back to the independence effect. the women that i talked to in those retaliatory situations got out of them and realized that they were ultimately better off out of them. i mean, this -- i would argue that if a guy's going to react this way, he's not necessarily somebody you want to be partnered with for your life even under the best of circumstances. and as one woman put it, it was

so much easier the dump him because i didn't depend on him financially. so i guess i still get back to the idea that, you know, let us not assume that all marriages were happy back when women were economically dependent because we knew that they weren't. this just creates in some couples a new source of tension. >> host: there is good news. [laughter] we do have good news in the book. there are so many stories. again, as i said, there's comfort in hearing other people's stories -- >> guest: there is. >> host: even in a time of social media, we don't talk. we talk in 120 characters or less. >> guest: right. >> host: but you have a book chock full of stories. as i said, i've had a couple of friends who were calling me this week talking about they're getting a divorce, and i said, wow, this comes at an appropriate time. >> guest: yeah. >> host: and i read them some passages, and they said, wow, thank you. >> guest: every writer hopes that you'll touch -- >> host: et really -- >> guest: -- somebody in that way. >> host: yeah. it really hit home for many be of my friends. but talk to me about some of your favorite stories, because just reading the stories is very

interesting for a single woman myself -- >> guest: right, right. >> host: to see what people are going through and to see how i may have to change my mindset. >> guest: right, right. well, first of all, i should say women don't talk about this. and even in success fortunately, happy marriages where, you know, she's grateful for his support, and he's grateful to have more time at home, women won't talk about the fact that they're the breadwinner because they worry it's going to emasculate or embarrass their partner. that's why i was so grateful to these guys in michigan who had great senses of humor about their role in the household, and they would talk about it, and they didn't feel emasculated. >> host: hawkins family. >> guest: the hawkins family. one of the husbands said they were having neighbors over for a card game, and he was dusting. he was cleaning up, and he had an apron on. so when the neighbors came, they started calling him cocoa. and he's, like, embraced that nickname. in fact, the family says now

that this has been put in the book, they think for the rest of his life he's going to be called cocoa. but he had a great sense of humor about that. that, to me, was one of my favorite stories. and, actually, one of my -- within that family, um, a couple who, one of the hawkins' daughters, rhonda, married a great guy who, um, she was working as a receptionist, he was working in the restaurant industry when they had their first child. he was making much more than she was, and he came to her and said, you know what? i want to stay home with her. and the reason was he had been raised by a single mom. he wanted to have a relationship with his daughters that -- and be a father to them in a way that he had not experienced. and she knew that the restaurant industry has brutal hours, and so it was going to be very difficult for him to be a hands-on father. so she said, okay. okay. you know, we'll make it work. i know that you'll pick up work, you'll be a bartender, you'll -- if we're stuck, i know that

you'll pick up work. so for about a decade, that's how they lived. she was a primary breadwinner, he was a stay-at-home dad, and then gradually -- they have three daughters, and gradually as they got older, he found his way back into the restaurant industry which he loves and had a job as a general manager at a really fine be restaurant, was loving the job. she got a promotion at her job that was going to require her to travel internationally because the auto industry is so global now on short notice. and he knew exactly what he had to do. he went to his boss, and he gave notice. he said i love this job, but she can't do her work if i'm going to be working, you know, these long -- somebody's got to be able to man the home front. and when i asked him about that, you know, i said was it hard to give up this job, he ended up working part time in the same job, but i said, was it hard to do that, to ratchet back this job that you loved? he said it just wouldn't have been fair. she had invested so much in her career, and she had made that

compromise for me so long ago, and it would not have been fair for me to not make the compromise for her. so he just, he quietly said, you know, compromised his career in order to facilitate hers. i thought that was a very nice story. you know, hitching your wagon to each other's star. and pushing your wife's wagon for her sometimes. >> host: i like that. talk to me about how the united states compares to japan right now or, as you said, we're light years probably ahead of them. but also with the u.k. as far as -- >> guest: yeah. >> host: -- as far as how women breadwinners are working out their relationships. >> guest: right, right. well, in europe in general, i mean, what is so interesting, and people don't realize this, is women are outnumbering men in colleges and universities around the world. in developed countries, but also in developing countries. and really, i mean, i think this is gonna have a profound impact in countries like, you know, in

middle eastern countries where women are becoming the more educated sex. there's some stuff coming on down the road, i think, but specifically looking at europe, i interviewed some spanish demographers who are the ones who have made those projections about globally what we're going to look like in 2050, and it is going to be a world of educated women and less educated men. and one of the things they're tracking is shifts in the marriage market, for example, in spain. what they're finding is that women are marrying more progressive northern european men because they want men who are, you know, willing to adapt to their level of education and that men are marrying immigrant women from more like central america or south america who still have a more traditional mindset. and so the way they put it was, you know, men want the kind of women who used to exist, and women want men who still have yet to exist. i don'tand i think that's what f

people are going through, transitional -- you know, we're waiting for a period where we all become more comfortable with this, and that is taking place in, i think, many european countries as well. and in part because of globalization and the european union and the ability to cross borders more easily. people are marrying people from other countries that still have the mindset that they want, be it a man who wants a traditional wife or a woman who wants a more progress i have partner. >> host: so is america light years ahead, or where are we? >> guest: where are we? you know, i think, i think we're adjusting. certainly, we're ahead of, we're way ahead of asian countries where there's just still a real mind shift going on. sounds like maybe we're ahead of spain. you know, the u.k. i would imagine this is a lot of female bread winning in the u.k., there's more and more in france, and i would imagine that, um, that some of the same growing pains are being felt in those

countries. british publications are always very interested in this topic, and for some reason the daily mail writes about it all the time. when i was researching it, i found it is a very frequent topic of conversation. and somehow, i mean, this is what i want to get away from. women who are breadwinners are often presented in a negative light. thai presented as sort of high-powered executives who have their husband on their speakerphone, and they're just barking orders at him. that may be true sometimes because it's hard for women to give up control of the home front. i think just as it's hard for men to relinquish their identity as a breadwinner, it's hard sometimes for women to give up that control. and, actually, that's another thing i saw was women adjusting to the fact that they weren't the ones controlling the home front. and one of the hawkins women said, you know, the only thing that drives me crazy is once a year when we go to back to school night, and he's danny, and i'm mrs. hawkins.

you know, the teachers don't know me, the parents don't know me, they know him. and sort of women getting -- so i think when women are barking orders over their speakerphone to the extent that they are, it's because they don't want to give up that, that role of being the keeper of the home front. but, you know, you asked about stories, and i interviewed one recessionary bread-winning wife whose husband had lost his job, and she went -- she had been a stay-at-home mom. she went back to her job in social services. he was at home with their boys in a way he never had been before, and she was a distant parent now coming home at the end of the day, and they had their little routine. and what she saw at the end of the year was she got written out of her son's artwork. she was no longer an image in the pictures. but she was -- this was very emotion physical for her to -- emotional for her to talk about. he had worked so hard for so long and had not been able to

spend that kind of time with their sons, and to see their boys with their father was moving for her and ultimately a happy experience that they were able to be together, and she was experiencing that male bread-winning experience. i'm earning the money that enables them to be together, but she was very happy to see them together, and she also had a very good sense of humor about it. i really do think that helps. and she would laugh now about how she was dissed in the artwork and, um, it had become a family joke. >> host: in conclusion with the few minutes that we have left, what would you recommend through your findings and studies to help both sides, male and women, to adjust to that socioeconomic shift? >> guest: right, right. okay. well, ignore the comments from the in-laws if they start making comments. try to avoid that wider social stigma or maybe even explain, look, this is working for us, so don't call him a freeloader,

okay? is he's supporting my career. you know, a wife could tell her in-laws, you know, his support is really valuable to me, don't stigmatize this. women get a joint checking account, don't try to retain control over your earnings. he has his atm card, you have yours, because women would say i worry he's emasculated having to worry for money, but why would he be asking you for money? it's a joint checking account. men need to stay interesting and stay moving forward so that the woman doesn't get a sense he's sitting home stagnating. you know, keep learning, keep moving, keep changing. don't sit around and stew and feel emasculated. move forward and stay dynamic. that's important to women. and talk about this to your children as though it is a good thing. and remind your children that even if the wife is away earning, that's an an expression of love for the children. she loves them, he loves them. talk to children as though this is okay. because it is okay.

ultimately. >> host: liza mundy, thank you so much for this very valuable hour. "the richer sex: how the new majority of female breadwinners is transforming sex, love and family." again, author liza mundy, thank you so much. >> guest: thank you so much. >> coming up this afternoon on booktv, stanley weintraub recounts franklin delano roosevelt's 1944 wartime presidential campaign. after that, david stewart on "american emperor" about the political career of aaron burr and his famous duel with alexander hamilton. and later, the late rodney king on his life following his 1991 beating by four los angeles police officers, his legal troubles and his addiction to alcohol. ..