Michelle Eilers, PhD

Every social theory undergirding Trumpism has been broken on the steel of Minnesotan resolve. The multiracial community in Minneapolis was supposed to shatter. It did not. It held until Bovino was forced out of the Twin Cities with his long coat between his legs. The secret fear of the morally depraved is that virtue is actually common, and that they’re the ones who are alone. In Minnesota, all of the ideological cornerstones of MAGA have been proved false at once. Minnesotans, not the armed thugs of ICE and the Border Patrol, are brave. Minnesotans have shown that their community is socially cohesive—because of its diversity and not in spite of it. Minnesotans have found and loved one another in a world atomized by social media, where empty men have tried to fill their lonely soul with lies about their own inherent superiority. Minnesotans have preserved everything worthwhile about “Western civilization,” while armed brutes try to tear it down by force.

Last week in Minnesota, I watched ordinary people risk their lives to protect their neighbors. In the process, they not only won a significant—though not final—victory against authoritarianism, they proved virtually every MAGA social theory wrong. (gift link) www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/0...

Trump’s Cuts to N.I.H. Grants Are Illegal, Federal Judge Rules The judge accused the Trump administration of discriminating against minorities and L.G.B.T.Q. people and ordered the government to restore much of the funding.

A federal judge on Monday declared the Trump administration’s move to cut hundreds of grants issued by the National Institutes of Health illegal, accusing the government of discrimination against minorities and L.G.B.T.Q. individuals. nyti.ms/4jSIjOG

Political appointees would have more control over Texas universities’ courses and hiring under bill OK’d by House Senate Bill 37 would give more power to university regents, who are appointed by the governor, to vet and veto new curricula and administrators.

Texas legislators just passed a bill that
gives politically-appointed regents control over faculty curriculum, hiring, & governance. It does what they accuse academics of doing: privileging ideas, biases, & agendas on political grounds, & silencing those that do not follow their ideology.

Doctor, how much does it cost? Moral values and price talk in a stratified consumer medical market

New paper out in Socio-Economic Review on how doctors and patients talk about the price of care in fertility medicine! I find that the way they talk about money is radically different depending on both the clinic's targeted clientele and organizational structure academic.oup.com/ser/advance-...

"Women are PIs on 58% of the canceled grants, although they are PIs on only 34% of all active NSF grants.

Similarly, Blacks are PIs on 17% of the terminated grants, although they make only 4% of the total pool. Hispanic PIs and those with disabilities were twice as likely to lose a grant."

Opinion | What Trump doesn’t know about the cost of raising kids The administration wants to offer families $5,000 for new babies. OK, what about helping with the next twenty years of their lives?

Like this op-ed author, I’m all for giving new parents money.

But doing so when you’re cutting the programs that help feed, house, educate, and care for children over their lives is beyond insulting.

(I disagree that this admin doesn’t know about the real costs, tho. It’s that they don’t care.)

Gov. Tim Walz State Address: "We have university students shoved into unmarked vans and fathers being tossed into Salvadorian gulags without a hint of due process. If you say you love freedom, but you don't believe freedom is for everybody, then the thing you love isn't freedom, it's privilege."

Why don’t young people use prescription contraception? Our new national MyVoice study asked 14–24-year-olds directly. The top 3 reasons:
🔸 Concern about side effects
🔸 Fear of judgment
🔸 Difficulty accessing care
www.jpagonline.org/article/S108...

Stability in the Number of Abortions from 2023 to 2024 in US States Without Total Bans Masks Major Shifts in Access

Yesterday, we released new estimates (for 2024) of the number of people obtaining abortions in states without total bans & the number of people traveling across state lines to access care
www.guttmacher.org/report/stabi...

Congratulations to @meilers.bsky.social and team for their award-winning poster!! #PAA2025

Excited to share some work in progress using the @nchatstudy.bsky.social data! #PAA2025

Massive crowd at Hands Off rally in St. Paul, Minnesota

Wow. #HandsOff rally in St. Paul, Minnesota is massive!

Just to be clear, this is a faculty member reporting a recent student at his institution to a fascist regime because he disagrees with the student’s political views. Absolutely chilling and vile.

Below is a list of statements. For each, please indicate whether you strongly disagree, somewhat disagree, somewhat agree, or strongly agree. We have gone so far in promoting women's equality that we are discriminating against men. ⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻ Across a 30-country average, people are divided on whether we have gone so far in promoting women’s equality that we are discriminating against men (44% agree vs. 49% disagree). Over half of men (53%) agreed with this statement compared to 35% of women.

Below is a list of statements. For each, please indicate whether you strongly disagree, somewhat disagree, somewhat agree, or strongly agree. When it comes to giving women equal rights with men, things have gone far enough in my country, % agree. ⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻⸻ Across age groups, men are more likely than women to agree that when it comes to giving women equal rights with men, things have gone far enough in their country. Younger men are more likely to agree with this statement than older men.

International Women's Day has become a day I approach trepidation--waiting to see Ipsos's annual poll.

This year's results don't curb my anxieties. 53% of men globally (47% of US men) agree that efforts toward gender equality have gone so far they're hurting men. And young men agree most of all.🧵1/

Trump Administration Ends Global Health Research Program The Demographic and Health Surveys were the only sources of reliable information in many countries on metrics such as mortality, nutrition and education.

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/26/h...

This is devastating.

ABORTION BANS KILL PEOPLE. States with bans KNOW it—so instead of facing the facts, they just straight up refuse to track the data. www.propublica.org/article/texa...

We are witnessing the wholesale destruction of our public health infrastructure and monitoring systems.

This administration is profoundly and deliberately anti-life.

It might be time to retire the GSS measure of ideal number of children This seems very nerdy and technical, but it’s about topics lots of people care about — birth rates and political polarization.

Since 1972, the General Social Survey has been asking, "What do you think is the ideal number of children for family to have?" It was a great question. Unfortunately, it's broken now and needs to be fixed or retired. I'll explain familyinequality.wordpress.com/2025/02/15/i...
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graph

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For 20 years I have used data from the Youth Risk Behavior Survey to educate many thousands of students about trends in teen sexual behavior. Now, because Trump and MAGA are afraid of knowledge and education, access to this information -- vital knowledge -- is denied the public. (From my textbook:

NEW: Yesterday, the Department of Transportation issued a memo that says DOT and DOT-supported programs should "give preference to communities with marriage and birth rates higher than the national average." www.transportation.gov/sites/dot.go...

When I teach Social Problems, I typically use plane crashes to talk about how the availability heuristic--the human tendency to overestimate the frequency of things we hear a lot about--drives "irrational" fear of extremely low-risk things like flying.

But that fear doesn't seem so irrational now.

psychotic

Are People Fleeing States With Abortion Bans?

Yes, according to our analysis of change-of-address data from the USPS. For more details, see our NBER WP or abstract below:
www.nber.org/papers/w33328

#EconSky

Joint work w/: @danieldench1.bsky.social + Kelly Lifchez + @econling.bsky.social

Created a new starter pack on SOGI things, queer demography, and folks interested in surveying sex and sex surveys--very loosely some quantitative sexualities. Let me know if you want to be added, its just a starter and I drew from my head of who was currently here:

"A study of federally funded research projects in the United States estimated that principal investigators spend on average about 45% of their time on administrative activities related to applying for and managing projects rather than conducting active research"

www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

This looks awesome!! Thanks for sharing!

Today @uclarepropolicy.bsky.social launched a database of 272 statements from organizations opposing abortion bans and the criminalization of repro care, demonstrating widespread recognition that abortion and pregnancy should not be subject to criminal laws. bit.ly/WidespreadOppositiontoAbortionBans

Abstract for "A Typology of US parents' mental loads: Core and episodic cognitive labor"

Delighted to share a new publication out today in the Journal of Marriage and Family w/ the brilliant @leahruppanner.bsky.social. In "A typology of US parents’ mental loads: Core and episodic cognitive labor" we assess underlying patterns in the domestic "mental load" among 3,000 US parents. 🧵 1/10