Yes, marriage rates have fallen, and fewer people getting married creates a host of social problems. But there is evidence that the marriages that are taking place are stronger.
Yes, the birth rate has fallen, heralding major demographic challenges. But more children are being raised by parents who are married to each other, which bodes well for their future lives.
New evidence shows that divorce is down, more children are living with their married parents, and low income folks are getting married again.
These were the findings of the Institute for Family Studies at the University of Virginia. The report by Brad Wilcox, Grant Bailey, Lyman Stone, and Wendy Wang is entitled Is Marriage Back? Divorce is Down, Family Stability is Up. From the introduction:
To be sure, the idea that American family life was headed in a linear direction, away from marriage, seemed plausible at the turn of the century. The fortunes of marriage in America had been in freefall seemingly since the 1960s. In the immediate wake of the family revolution that took hold 60 years ago, divorce and single parenthood more than doubled, marriage rates plummeted, and diverse family forms surged. . . .
But marriage is not dead yet. The family revolution that took hold in the second half of the twentieth century appears to be spent. If the institution of marriage is understood, fundamentally, as the vehicle for the bearing and rearing of children, there are promising signs that a “marriage renaissance,” to quote sociologist John Seel, may be in the offing.
Here are some of the findings. . . .
Divorce is down. Fewer marriages are ending in divorce, in stark contrast to the family break-ups of the 1970s and 1980s. According to the report,
The biggest shift relates to divorce. After peaking in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the divorce rate has been falling in recent decades. In fact, the divorce rate has hit a 50-year-low. Since the 1980s, each cohort of married couples has seen their risk of divorce decline. . . .as marriage has become more selective, with more educated, affluent, and religious couples becoming more likely to put a ring on it than the general population, marriage has been stabilizing in one cohort after another.
Calculating the exact percentages of the marriages that end in divorce is a complicated and contested statistical problem, as the report explains in a separate section. Using one metric, before the sexual revolution, fewer than a third of marriages ended in divorce. With the 1960s and 1970s, that proportion rose to 50%, a number that has entered conventional wisdom, so that some people have reasoned, “If you only have 50/50 odds of making it, is marriage really worth the risk?” Today, though, by that arguably overstated metric, that proportion has dropped to 40%. “The bottom line,” say the researchers: “Most married couples will make it.”
Single-parenting has leveled off. After shooting up dramatically, year after year, the percentage of children born out of wedlock peaked at 41% in 2009. But over the next 16 years, that number has stopped growing and has inched down to 40%, where it is today.
More children are being raised by their married parents. Conversely, two-thirds (66%) of children today are being raised by their two parents who are married to each other. That’s up from 64% in 2012.
Among those with low-incomes, more children are being raised by married parents. The drop-off of marriage and the rise of single parenting have been most dramatic in the working class and with low-income Americans. But that is rebounding.
It has been said that the upper class changes the culture, but the lower class pays the price. The affluent college-educated cultural elite initiated the sexual revolution, but they continued to get married at a high rate, have relatively low divorce rates, and both parents raised their children. Whereas for low-income folks, marriage collapsed, divorce soared, and single-parenting skyrocketed.
Currently, 87% of children in the upper third range of household income are raised by their married parents. For the middle third, the percentage is 70%. Those percentages have been fairly stable for the last few decades. But children in the lower third household income bracket, a majority are raised by single parent. Only 38% of low-income children were raised by married parents in 2012, but that number is headed upwards, to 42% today.
Among black Americans, more children are being raised by married parents. In 2012, only 33% of black children were being raised by their married parents. Today, that number has climbed to 39%.
The share of Americans who are married has leveled off. “The upswing in marriage’s fortunes, however, seems limited to children and families,” comment the researchers. “For adult men and women, the story is not as positive.” The marriage rate is still low, though it appears to have leveled off.
The percentage of adults aged 25-55 who are married is only 55.8%. As recently as 2000, the percentage was 64.6%.
The Institute for Family Studies estimates that about 1-in-3 of today’s young adults will never marry, and about 1-in 4 will never have children.
Final Thoughts. Though we see progress, all is not well with the institution of marriage and the family. But the drop in the marriage and parenting rate may well be connected with the progress. The report’s conclusion says, “One reason that marriage and families are stabilizing in the United States is that family formation has become more selective for the kinds of men and women who have the economic resources and cultural commitments to succeed at family life.”
Put another way, the people who are choosing to get married in this climate are taking it more seriously and are making stronger commitments to each other. And those who are choosing to have children are being more intentional about their parenthood, with both mother and father committed to raising their kids.
The report says as much: “As marriage has become more selective, with more educated, affluent, and religious couples becoming more likely to put a ring on it than the general population, marriage has been stabilizing in one cohort after another.”
Notice the part about “religious couples.” Marriage and parenthood are vocations. Those who know that they are called by God to be a husband or wife, father or mother, have a foundation that cannot be easily shaken.
At the same time, though, that marriage and parenthood are vocations also means that not everyone is called to those offices. Single Christians also have a calling, which, according to St. Paul, has some advantages over marriage and parenthood. (See 1 Corinthians 7.)
“Only let each person lead the life that the Lord has assigned to him, and to which God has called him” (1 Corinthians 7:17).
Illustration: Silhouette photo of family during sunrise via PickPik, Public Domain
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