Wives are catching up to husbands as the primary breadwinners in marriages but men still have the edge in most households, the Pew Research Center reported Thursday.

The share of marriages in which husbands provide more than 60% of combined household earnings fell steadily from 85% of married couples in 1982 to 55%, the polling company reported in a January survey.

Over the same period, the share of households where wives are the primary or sole breadwinners rose from 5% to 16%. And the share of “egalitarian” marriages in which both spouses provide 40-60% of household income increased from 11% to 29%.

While the 1970s and 1980s saw more married women enter the workforce, Pew reported that the more recent change comes from an increase in the number of college-educated women entering higher-paying fields.

“The bottom line, from our perspective, is that the typical husband is not earning less than he used to,” Kim Parker, Pew’s director of social trends, told The Washington Times. “It’s just that his wife is earning significantly more, a reflection of devoting more hours to the paid labor market and also movement into managerial and professional occupations.”

Despite the change, 48% of those surveyed told the company that men prefer to earn more than their wives. Another 13% said they think most men want to earn about the same as their wives and just 3% said most men want to earn less.

By comparison, 22% said most women want a husband who earns more than they do and 26% said most want to earn about the same amount. Only 7% said they believe most women want to earn more than their husbands.

Pew surveyed 5,152 U.S. adult members of its American Trends Panel on Jan. 18-24. The margin of error was plus or minus 1.7 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.

• Sean Salai can be reached at ssalai@washingtontimes.com.