Stop Saying Half of Marriages End in Divorce!

So, it's Tuesday, and that usually means a "Classic" blog post (on weeks when I get the chance to do one).  However, today I got struck by one of my pet peeves that I had to get off my chest, and since it relates directly to one of the areas of law in which I practice (family law), I thought a blog post might be a good way to do that.  If you're wondering what that pet peeve is, the title says it all - that people keep repeating the same old line that half of marriages end in divorce.  It needs to stop, and if this blog post gets even one person to stop repeating this line, I will consider it a success.

There are three big reasons why I think this saying needs to go away:

1 - It is actually likely that the 50% number has never been true.

2 - Divorce rates have steadily decreased over the past twenty years, yet the magical "50%" number somehow stays the same - math says this isn't possible.

3 - This number, by artificially inflating our view of the frequency of divorce, downplays the often very serious reasons why many marriages fall apart, leading to grossly unfair assumptions about people who have been through divorce.

So, let me tackle each of the three reasons for a moment.  First up is my point that the 50% number has likely never been true.

So, divorce rates are very hard to calculate because marriage by definition can last a long time and end in divorce, last a short time and end in death, and many other variables come into play.  As a result, guessing the divorce rate is a very imprecise science.  You can also look at it two ways - do you want to say what percentage of marriages entered on a certain date ended in divorce?  If so, there are marriages still going on from that date that might end in divorce, so your number will undershoot.  Moreover, marriages from the past are unlikely to tell you about the likelihood of success of marriages today.  Do you want to count how many adults have been married and divorced?  If so, a good percentage of them are re-married in successful marriages, so you will undercount the number of marriages involved and get an artificially high divorce rate.

The end result of all of this is that the divorce rate is hard to calculate to begin with.  So, with that already in mind, where did this 50% number come from?  The fact is, no one really knows, but there's a good guess.  A series of articles came out in 1979, 1980 and 1981 (yes, that long ago) claiming that there was a 50% divorce rate due to a ridiculous misreading of facts.  For example, in 1981, there were 2.4 million marriages but 1.2 million divorces - thus, the articles concluded that half of marriages ended in divorce.  However, almost none of those divorces were from marriages that started that year, and there were 54 million marriages already in existence prior to 1981.

So, in other words, the 50% number was flawed from the start, there has never been a 50% divorce rate in this country.

Now, on to my second point, that the divorce rate has been dropping.  Since interest has grown in doing real calculations, as opposed to the hysteria mentioned above, it has been widely accepted that the best measure is the second one I mentioned above - find what percentage of adults who have ever been married have also been divorced.  Yes, this will miss re-marriages that are successful, but it will also miss re-marriages that are unsuccessful, so the belief is that the number, while imperfect, is amongst the better indicators that we have.  So, with that in mind, what is the divorce rate (or our best guess of it) and how has it changed?

Well, 2009 census numbers tell us that somewhere around 35% of adults who have ever been married have ever been divorced - down from a high of 40% in 1996.  So, our current best estimate of divorce rate is actually around 35%.

We can also look at an alternative measure, however, in that the census does release numbers also showing what percentage of marriages make it to certain anniversaries.  Remember, however, that this number will dramatically overstate the divorce rate because marriages ending in death of one spouse also will not have made it to that anniversary.  So, about 55% of marriages entered into between 1960 and 1964 made it to their 40th anniversary (this study was done in 2009 of data that was a bit older, thus why we are talking 40th anniversary, not 50th), about 53% of marriages entered into between 1965 and 1969 made it to their 35th anniversary, about 53% of marriages entered into between 1970 and 1974 made it to their 30th anniversary, about 54% of marriages entered into between 1975 and 1979 made it to their 25th anniversary, about 58% of marriages entered into between 1980 and 1984 made it to their 20th anniversary, about 66% of marriages entered into between 1985 and 1989 made it to their 15th anniversary, about 76% of marriages entered into between 1990 and 1994 made it to their 10th anniversary, and about 89% of marriages entered into between 1995 and 1999 made it to their 5th anniversary.

So, we can see a couple of things from those numbers.  First, the age groups show us an increase in divorce rates in the 70's, followed by a decrease.  Second, some of the later groups are not too reliable, since they still have plenty of time to get divorced (in my experience, most divorces happen after the 5th anniversary but before the 15th anniversary - and census numbers back me up on that, showing the average age of a marriage at divorce to be 8 years - but of course I do see plenty outside that range).  Third, however, every single group still had a majority of marriages together at the time of the study.  That means not a one could have had a divorce rate of 50%, especially when you consider that a good percentage of these marriages (especially the older ones) likely ended in death, not divorce.

In short, it is clear now that if there ever was a 50% divorce rate (there almost definitely never was, but if), that's certainly not true now.  So, you have no reason to look at a couple and conclude they have a 50% chance of not making it - you'd be much better served looking at them and thinking there's about a two-thirds chance they will make it.

Now, my final point was that this false statistic is actually harmful.  Because of the field of law I practice, I often see the stigma people face associated with divorce - even though the vast majority of cases I handle are ones where a divorce is clearly necessary.

Nonetheless, we all know stories of people who rushed to a divorce over something small and stupid.  Combine that with the notion that half of marriages end in divorce and our own inherent knowledge that it can't really be that half of all marriages have severe enough problems to warrant divorce, then we reach a culture that concludes that most divorces are just people being too lazy to fix their problems.  This further creates a culture that stigmatizes those who have been divorced, without good reason to do so.

I firmly believe that if we put the 50% number to bed, we can grapple with the fact that, in my opinion, most divorces are warranted.  Most come after the couple tried very hard to solve their problems first.  Many, in fact, come much later than they should have, precisely because the couple tried so hard to make it work.

I am happily married, and because I know the facts and the numbers, I expect to stay married to the same woman for the rest of our lives.  Nonetheless, I refuse to belittle and demean those whose marriages do not work out, who need to get on with their lives, and who make the often gut-wrenching, personally devastating choice to get a divorce.  If we can finally get this 50% number out of our vernacular, I would hope that would mean many more people would be ready to join me in refusing to think less of those whose marriages just didn't work.