Trends in Marital Dissolution by Women's Education in the United States

Steven P. Martin
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Steven P. Martin: University of Maryland College Park

Demographic Research, 2006, vol. 15, issue 20, pages 537-560

Abstract: I use the Survey of Income and Program Participation (N = 16,452) to measure trends in marital dissolution rates for U.S. women by education level. In marriage cohorts from the mid-1970s to the 1990s, marital dissolution rates fell among women with a 4-year college degree or more, but remained high among women with less than a 4-year college degree. This diverging trend began in the mid-1970s and is not explained by recent increases in women's overall educational attainment, nor by recent increases in age at marriage timing and premarital childbearing. These results suggest a growing association between socioeconomic disadvantage and family instability.

Keywords: education; family demography; marital dissolution; social inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J1 Z0 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
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