US Divorce rate hits lowest point since 1970

MobBoss said:
Heh, simply because there are fewer married people doesnt correlate into a lower divorce rate. Fewer pure numbers, yes...but in this case the actual rate has decreased as well.
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All that tells me is that people hesitate to marry more, so that those who do are more determined to stay married. You forgot to mention the recently published statistic that there are more unmarried households now than married ones, for the first time possibly in history, in the U.S..

Hardly...stable families are much more productive and thus are far better for the economy.
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Marriage doesn't equate to family stability. People could be married and cheating, generating illegitimate children elsewhere, and beating their spouses and children.
 
MobBoss said:
But asking proof please of jolly was merely asking if he was getting his information from a source or if he were just making an assumption.
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Are you really a Prophet of Common Sense? Because what I made should have been recognized by you as a common sense assumption.
 
MobBoss said:
Sigh. So now people taking their marriages more seriously and having a lower national divorce rate isnt good news?
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Have you bothered to either read my posts or read the article? If you did then you would realize that your conclusions have nothing to do with the statistics from the article you quoted. I haven't claimed marriage to be either "good" or "bad" (that's a discussion for another thread). The only thing I said is that factually, most of your statements are baseless.
 
JollyRoger said:
Are you really a Prophet of Common Sense? Because what I made should have been recognized by you as a common sense assumption.
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Easy now...I was just yanking your chain. Humor.....its a concept.
 
El_Machinae said:
The number of 'stable families' is also at its lowest point since the 70s.
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And the number of gay marriages and same-sex civil unions are at all-time highs. :lol:
 
MB, I'm not trying to be overly negative about this. I'm a huge believer in marriage, and the benefits it brings. But I'm not sure this news is really all that good.

From the article:
Adding such factors together, Patrick Fagan of the conservative Heritage Foundation sees a bad situation.

"Cohabitation is very fragile, and when unmarried parents split, for the child it might as well be a divorce," Fagan said. "Among those who are marrying there's increased stability, but overall the children of the nation are getting a rawer and rawer deal from their parents."
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There's some good news, yes. But I think it's clear even from the article that the American family as an institution is still in pretty bad shape.
 
I've read the OP, but not the whole thread.

This is good news. It tells me that succeeding generations are learning from the mistakes of the Baby Boomers.

Our biggest social challenge now is bastard children. The last figure I saw was that 70% of African-Americans are born to unwed parents. Among Caucasians, I think it's around 50%. Some people aren't getting divorced because they aren't getting married in the first place. We have to fix this somehow.
 
I think a fair reading of the stats show that more marriages are being aborted (relationships where wedding vows never get exchanged) and less are being executed (divorce) in relation to the entire married & unmarried population. The rate of exectuion, however, once a marriage is "born", has not declined.
 
Nanocyborgasm said:
Marriage doesn't equate to family stability. People could be married and cheating, generating illegitimate children elsewhere, and beating their spouses and children.
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MobBoss was talking about the economy, not social problems like those. Married families are the backbone of the economy. They are the prime demographic targeted by businesses of all types for many reasons.

Obviously, if adultery & domestic violence are going on, it needs to stop one way or the other.

JollyRoger said:
I think a fair reading of the stats show that more marriages are being aborted (relationships where wedding vows never get exchanged) and less are being executed (divorce) in relation to the entire married & unmarried population. The rate of exectuion, however, once a marriage is "born", has not declined.
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There are times when my wife wants to execute me.:lol:
 
MobBoss said:
Sigh. So now people taking their marriages more seriously and having a lower national divorce rate isnt good news?
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I'm not sure why you're having a hard time understanding what these statistics really mean. Its not like any of us or those who disagree w/ your reading are opposed to your desire here. I'd love to see a lower divorce rate, etc...

But you have to look at these numbers in the appropriate context.

If you had a population of 1000 women and no men the divorce rate would be 0. Would you try and argue that that sub-group has some kind of uber commitment to marriage? Of course not, you'd make the obvious point that in an all female sub-group you don't have any marriages.

So, you have to look at the number of marriages, not just the raw population. The stats indicate that the failure rate of a marriage is about the same.

If anything, I think the numbers are bad for marriage in that what they really show is that less people per capita want to get married.
 
Godwynn said:
Wow, I thought it was much higher than that. A family friend told us it was a little over 50% got divorced. Then she got divorced. :(
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That statistic is 50% of marriages end in divorce. What skews the statistic is people who get married 5 or 6 times or some other outrageous number. Statistics can be molded to say pretty much anything.
 
Maimonides said:
MobBoss was talking about the economy, not social problems like those. Married families are the backbone of the economy. They are the prime demographic targeted by businesses of all types for many reasons.
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Then those business better pull their heads out of their asses. This is not the 1950's. There's nothing about marriage that induces stability and wealth. Considering that 50% of marriages end in divorce (in some states, like California, it's 65%), there's little that can be said of marriages that is stable.
 
I hope the rate of contested divorces is also on the same decline.

MobBoss said:
Well, it would seem that the USA is finally shaking off the craziness inflicted upon our families from the '60s.
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Well, it would seem that the USA is finally realizing that the vast majority of lawyers, judges, and fiduciaries (law guardians for children, etc.) are conspiring with one another to profit off of a broken family by pitting husband and wife off in a war of attrition designed to decimate family assets.
 
Maimonides said:
Some people aren't getting divorced because they aren't getting married in the first place. We have to fix this somehow.
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If I might suggest a place to start, start with family law and divorce courts. Start with instituting gender equality in divorce. Stop treating women like they need men and will starve without a monthly paycheck from, and the assets of, their ex-husband.
 
Quiet Sound said:
If I might suggest a place to start, start with family law and divorce courts. Start with instituting gender equality in divorce. Stop treating women like they need men and will starve without a monthly paycheck from, and the assets of, their ex-husband.
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Texas has a higher than average divorce rate despite having no alimony.
 
Sounds good, but still does not diminish my fears of a divorce.
 
.Shane. said:
If "yourself" then why do you care? Do you control your own life or not?
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I may control my life, but I don't control the life of my future spouse.
 
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