If you're seeing this message, it means we're having trouble loading external resources on our website.

If you're behind a web filter, please make sure that the domains *.kastatic.org and *.kasandbox.org are unblocked.

# What are your chances of getting divorced?

## Problem

There are often media reports on the national divorce rate in the US amounting to nearly 50, percent of all marriages. However, recent research shows that the overall divorce rate has been dropping slowly since reaching a peak around 1980. However, the likelihood of divorce has varied considerably among different segments of the population. In Cycle 5 of the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG), published in a 2002 report, racial differences in marital disruption were examined. The NSFG is nationally representative, focusing on marriage, divorce, and other factors affecting women’s health. It was based on face-to-face interviews with 10, comma, 847 women 15-44 years of age in 1995. The figure below shows the probabilities of marital disruption.
Figure 1: Probability that the first marriage is disrupted (separation or divorce) based upon duration of marriage and race/ethnicity: United States, 1995.
More recent studies found that racial variations in divorce have been gradually diminishing, in particular, the greater similarity of divorce rates between whites and blacks are largely explained by how fewer blacks are marrying. Going beyond ethnicity, other studies have assessed various background characteristics of people entering a marriage that have major implications for their risk of divorce. Also using NSFG data, the table below shows some percentage point decreases in the risk of divorce or separation during the first ten years of marriage, according to personal and social factors such as education, religion, and income.
Table 1: Factors that reduce the risk of marital disruption
Factors that reduce probability of marital disruptionRisk difference in marital disruption
Some college (vs. high school dropout)minus, 13, percent
Affiliated with a religion (vs. no religion)minus, 14, percent
Parents not divorced (vs. divorced)minus, 14, percent
Age >25 at marriage (vs. age is less than18 at marriage)minus, 24, percent
Having a baby >7 months after marriage (vs. having a baby before marriage)minus, 24, percent
Annual income >dollar sign, 25, comma, 000 (vs. income is less thandollar sign, 25, comma, 000)minus, 30, percent
*The percentages apply to the first ten years of marriage.