BETSEY STEVENSON and Justin Wolfers might sound like almost any upscale couple.

They have impressive degrees and serious careers and the social markers that go with them. They have one child, but there are two strollers, a Bugaboo and a Bob baby jogger, parked in the front hall of their stylish home here. Their daughter, Matilda, who is almost 2 1/2 , attends classes in art, music and soccer. She is not allowed to eat any meat or sugar, not even in birthday cake.

But when Ms. Stevenson, 40, and Mr. Wolfers, 39, start talking about say, diapers or nursing, the conversation takes an odd turn. Suddenly, words like “inputs” and “outputs” — the economic kind — creep in. Mention loading the dishwasher and he tosses out “fungibility.” The low cost of two big teddy bears they bought for Matilda gets Ms. Stevenson ruminating on productivity gains.

If they don’t quite sound like the rest of us, that’s because these two Harvard Ph.D.’s form a sort of power couple in the world of the dismal science, or at least a certain corner of it. Faculty members at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and currently visiting fellows at Princeton, Ms. Stevenson and Mr. Wolfers have become the go-to pair on the economics of marriage, divorce and child-rearing. That they are themselves a couple — unmarried, for tax reasons they regularly cite — adds to the allure.

For years, they have enamored the news media with their eclectic brand of the economics of everyday life, in the “Freakonomics” vein. Their choice of topics tends to push people’s buttons and to grab the attention even of those who might ignore the latest figures on nonfarm payrolls or industrial capacity utilization.

Their research shows that men have grown happier as women have become unhappier. (Why? They don’t really know.) Are people in rich countries happier than people in poor countries? (Yes.) And contrary to popular belief, they show that the divorce rate in America has been falling, not rising, for decades. They cite a number of possible reasons, including more balanced expectations between men and women about how a marriage will actually work, as well as the fact that fewer people are marrying in the first place.

Economics pervades their personal lives. They sifted through unemployment statistics to find the optimal population of potential nannies for Matilda: 20-something teachers. If you’re relatively affluent, as they are, they recommend outsourcing child care and domestic chores so you can spend your time on more leisure or economically worthwhile pursuits. That’s what they do.

Yes, they say they disagree from time to time. Mr. Wolfers, an iPad fan, wants to get rid of their print books. Ms. Stevenson has read the research suggesting that children go further educationally if they grow up surrounded by books. So far, the books have stayed — in custom-built shelves.

Another reason they stand out is that they have a remarkable ability to render economic concepts in simple terms. Mr. Wolfers once distilled a research paper by fellow economists on “present value earnings losses associated with job displacement” like this: Losing your job stinks. (He used a more colorful word.)

Both are active on Twitter, where Ms. Stevenson lobs playful comments on the gender imbalances of academic economics.

“I know it is a policy, rather than an economics conference, because there is a line for the women’s toilet,” she tweeted last November.

It also helps that they don’t fit the stereotypes of tweedy academics. Mr. Wolfers, who is Australian, looks like a nerdy surfer and tends to pull his chin-length blond hair into a ponytail. Ms. Stevenson has an irresistible laugh and a stylish taste in clothes and shoes.

Their professional stature extends beyond their study of domestic life. Until last September, Ms. Stevenson was the chief economist at the Labor Department, and has written influential papers on the effect of Title IX, which guarantees women equal access to academic and athletic programs, on women’s education and on future job success. Mr. Wolfers has been a co-author of papers on subjects as diverse as capital punishment and racial bias among N.B.A. referees. They are now writing an introductory economics textbook.

BUT it is their work on lovenomics, as it might be called, and their popularity with the news media, that have brought them attention outside the academy. Their modest celebrity has led to some sniping among their peers — several would not publicly declare their criticism — but their fans are effusive.

“They’re terrific economists,” said N. Gregory Mankiw, the Harvard economics professor who taught the couple during graduate school, adding that he saw no evidence that their public profile had “affected the quality of their scientific work.” (Professor Mankiw is a contributor to the Economic View column in Sunday Business.)