According to Sylvia Ann Hewlett, writing in the Harvard Business Review, 33% of successful career women (business executives, doctors, lawyers, academics, etc) in the 41-55 age bracket are childless. In corporate America, 42%. I figure that the TFR of this class is under 1.0 .

The numbers are worse for the best-paid, most exalted positions, so TFR for women emerging from Harvard Business School or Harvard Law must be lower yet.

On the whole these Harvard women are a good deal smarter than average, albeit crazy as a bedbug. Since intelligence is highly heritable, this trend (along with others, of course) is fueling that hell-bound train.

Now if these women were part of a short-term maximum effort aimed at stopping an asteroid impact, this would make sense, but I’m pretty sure they’re not.