Thursday, July 25, 2002
The losing appeal of marriage in America
A story published today by the Washington Post reports that according to a government study, women are becoming hesitant when it comes to marriage, with those who are divorced much less likely to marry again than those of their parents' generation.
The survey from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says it is the first to measure national patterns of cohabitation and separation among American couples, discovering hidden trends.
Detailed interviews were conducted with 11,000 women to try to unlock the secrets of a stable union and what happens to people when their marriage hits the rocks.
By the age of 30, three-quarters of the women in the United States had been married, and about half had lived with a man before marriage. Most of those living together — 70 percent — got married within five years.
But these marriages are also more likely to break up. After 10 years, 40 percent of couples who had lived together before marriage had broken up. That compares with 31 percent of those who did not live together first.
The recipe for a lasting marriage or cohabitation was very similar: economic security, maturity and being brought up in a stable two-parent family. Those factors were more likely to be present for women in long-term relationships.
One of the most significant trends in the past half-century has been the marriage rate of women who already have been divorced — only half of them marry again or are even cohabiting after five years.
The figures are interesting, said Matt Bramlett, lead author of the report and an analyst at the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics, because now there is less stigma attached to divorced women and there are also more divorced people available in the "marriage market."
Another trend previously missed by surveys is the significant proportion of couples who are separated but not divorced, particularly among black and Hispanic couples.
Nearly all separated white women divorce within five years, but a quarter of Hispanic women and a third of black women do not. A substantial proportion of these remain as "married separations" for the long term.
