Posted on 07/18/2005 2:34:36 PM PDT by Indy Pendance
MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. (AP) - The divorce rate in the United States is falling, and a new study offers an explanation: More people are shacking up instead of getting married.
In a report released Tuesday, the co-directors of the National Marriage Project, a nonpartisan institute at Rutgers University that promotes marriage, said couples who get married are more committed to each other than those who are just live together.
The study analyzed data gathered by the U.S. Census Bureau and other researchers.
Nine of every 1,000 married women in the United States divorced in 1960, according to the study. The rate increased to more than 22 per 1,000 by 1980 and has steadily declined since, to a little under 18 per 1,000 in 2004.
Meanwhile, the number of unmarried, opposite-sex couples living together has climbed from 439,000 in 1960 to more than 5 million now.
And the marriage rate has fallen over the past three decades: Seventy-seven out of every 1,000 single women got married in 1976; last year, the number was fewer than 40 per 1,000, the study found.
Report authors David Popenoe and Barbara Dafoe Whitehead said they are glad the divorce rate is on the decline, but they are worry about the children of couples who are living together without marrying.
"The breakup rate of cohabiting couples is considerably higher" than that of married couples, Popenoe said. "As more and more cohabiting couples have children, that becomes more of a problem."
...couples who get married are more committed to each other than those who are just live together.
^^
Well, I suppose they "are just live together" as opposed to being "just dead together".
Jeez, are there no proofreaders anymore at these news agencies?
I agree with everything you said, except that the lawyer industry is the precise mechanism for effecting the plan you described.
..anti-male bias in the divorce courts in killing marraige.
&&
That may be a big factor, but I believe that easy sex is a bigger factor. The old saw about why buy the cow...
Uhmmm, yes. After seeing a few cases of men getting everything they've worked for all their lives robbed from them by their ex-wives, egged on by a blood-sucking ambulance chaser, yes.
Just think. If people got along with each other, lawyers would starve to death.
One could also claim that shyster slip and fall lawyers are responsible for weakening our economy, specifically our health care system ie John Edwards. This is a double assault on our health care system, the other "front" is the illegal aliens and how they're helping to break it.
Consider the fact that the press brings an issue to the public and makes "news" out of it. In 5, 10 or however many years when our health care system has been broken by shyster lawyers and illegal immigrants....oops, time to declare CRISIS by the our enemy within (aka the media). Hmm, I wonder what the solution will be? None other than government enforced death aka "socialized medicine"!!! Then the phony politicians will pick up the ball and run with it...
btt
In Illinois you have to live together 7 years for common law marriage. But I thought that these days, you don't even need to get married in order to get things like health insurance from your "significant other"
Do you know the real definition of a bachelor?
A Man who has seriously looked at marriage...
Whatever would we do without experts?
The lawyers are just a small part of it.
Sinful people hurt marriage.
And, yep, that includes the shack-ups.
Illinois does NOT allow common law marriages to be formed in their states. Here are the states where common law marriages can be formed.
Alabama
Colorado
Iowa
Kansas
Montana
New Hampshire (only for inheritance purposes)
Oklahoma? (There is apparently conflicting case law as to whether it has been abolished)
Rhode Island
South Carolina
Texas
Utah
Washington, D.C.
In a few states- common law marriages were only recently abolished, so those formed before that date are still valid:
Georgia (before 1/1/97)
Idaho (before 1/1/96)
Ohio (before 10/10/91)
Oklahoma (if abolished, then before 11/1/98)
Pennsylvania (before 1/1/05)
Common law marriage formed in any of this states are recognized in every state, so if you form a CLM in Iowa and then move to Illinois and split up, you must get a divorce in order to remarry. There is no time limit- you can live together and hold yourself out to be married for two years and be married, and you can live together and get things separate for twenty years and not be married.
I don't believe they create the initial marital problem, but I very much believe they can fan the flames and raise the stakes.
I hear ya!
I've been divorced for 14 years. Fortunately for me, the child support gravy train for the ex-wife will be cut in half by this time next year, and eliminated 2 years after that.
I'm currently living with the most wonderful woman in the world, and neither of us are even slightly interested in getting married. Why?
Simple: My divorce was horrendously traumatic for me and my sons, and my girlfriend is a child of divorce. We don't want to go through it, and we feel that we'd be screwing up a good thing.
Agree with the first part, but not the second.
For the first part: I didn't WANT to get a divorce, but the ex-wife thought snorting cocaine and whoring around were more important than seeing to our kids' welfare. Besides, with the divorce, she'd get her cut of my paycheck no matter what - unlike having to share the burden during rough times had she stayed with me.
For the second part: I don't think having a State-issued piece of paper makes any difference if the man and woman involved truly love and respect each other, and are in a monogamous relationship.
I'd rather "live in sin" with the woman I love than be trapped in a loveless (but Church- and State-sanctioned) relationship with a greedy, selfish harlot.
"The number one predictor of divorce is marriage"
Good one!Really,I just can't see myself sharing the same living space with the SAME person day in,day out.People get on my nerves,including my own brother and mom if I am with them constantly over a long period of time.
I need my space and that is why I won't get married OR live with anyone cohabitationally-even though I HAVE done both in my past.
Hmm, and yet I'm not gripped in the perpetual fear that my wife will divorce me.
Or the anti-male bias present in America's schools, entertainment industry, etc...
How about, "Marriage Rate Drops Precipitously"?
You can't get divorced if you don't get married.
Why stop with the divorce rate? Dump the laws against murder and crime will go down. Better yet, abolish all laws and there won't be any crime. (sarcasm off)
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