Replies

Yes, that’s why I said that could mean that 50% of marriages end in divorce. English much?

My point is that the statistics you cited claimed that 50% of 1st marriages ended in divorce, while more than 50% of the 2nd and even more 3rd marriages did.

If the total divorces is 50%, you can’t have 50% of 1st marraiges and more than 50% of 2nd and 3rd marriages ending in divorce.

And since every 2nd and 3rd divorce is preceded by a 1st divorce, it seems clear that more than half of first marriages survive, and it’s the divorced people that drive up the total statistics, people who marry 3 times or more (although each time the actually re-marry, they do help the statistics).

Here is how the statistics play out, looking at a single individual:

1st marriage - 0% divorce rate
1st divorce - 100% divorce rate
2nd marriage - 50% divorce rate
2nd divorce - 100% divorce rate
3rd marriage - 66% divorce rate
3rd divorce - 100% divorce rate
4th marriage - 75% divorce rate
4th divorce - 100% divorce rate.

Note that each new divorce drives the rate up to 100% for that individual, and each new marriage only partly recovers the rate.

One person who divorces 4 times requires 4 others who never divorce in order to have a 50% divorce rate. And if that was the case, the “1st-marriage” divorce rate would be 20%, while in my extreme example the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th marriage divorce rates would all be 100%. If the guy got married again, we’d need 3 other couples who never divorced, and the 1st-marriage divorce rate in the group would be 25% (oddly, the 2nd and 3rd and 4th marriage rate would still be 100%, and the 5th marriage rate would be 0%).

Since I have found no statistics that show a 50% 1st-marriage divorce rate, and reams of information that even the “50% of all marriages end in divorce” is a misreading of statistics, I do not believe it is possible that 50% of FIRST MARRIAGES could end in divorce.