Why golf has gone the way of the three-martini lunch . The golf industry is pushing 9-hole rounds and more family-friendly country clubs.

Marketwatch reports:

In nearly half of U.S. families, both parents are fully employed, and of those families, nearly 40% of couples equally share the managing of their children’s schedules and about 60% share household chores equally, according to a Pew Research survey released in November 2015. In 1970, just 31% of families consisted of both parents working full time, while in 46% of families, the mother stayed at home, according to Pew.

Additionally, the proliferation of mobile devices in the workplace has blurred the line between work and leisure time — with the latter suffering, studies show. About two-thirds of U.S. workers owned smartphones in 2013, according to Pew, and the same amount reported working during their leisure and vacation times, according to Accenture. “There’s a lot of competition for people’s available leisure time,” says Nick Petrillo, an analyst at IBISWorld.

“We live in a 24/7 world,” says Gerald Celente, publisher of Kingston, N.Y.-based Trends Journal. “People are working longer and harder just to stay even. It’s a virtual world, and golf has no place in that world.”

In addition to its appeal as a leisure activity, playing golf used to be an integral part of climbing the corporate ladder, Celente says, but the practice has gone the way of the “three-martini lunch.” Younger workers have begun to move away from doing business on the golf course or at the steakhouse, instead bringing clients to faster-paced activities like CrossFit.

An interesting article.