The average age at which people get married has been increasing over the years. For instance, your grandparents may have considered it fairly normal to get married in their early 20s or even their teens. Today, that very rarely happens. The average marriage age for men is over 30, and it’s over 28 for women.
This change in marriage age has certainly had an impact on divorce. Let’s take a look at two ways that it has done so.
More stable marriages
For one thing, researchers have found that getting married later can create more stable marriages. Some have pegged the ideal age as 32 years old. As the average age at which people get married moves closer to this ideal age, it is generally going to lower the divorce rate for these couples.
Breaking up before marriage
Another significant thing to consider, however, is that people aren’t necessarily avoiding having romantic relationships and living together before they get married. The social stigma over cohabitation is not what it was for previous generations. What this means is that many couples will start a relationship and live together in their early 20s, and they may still break up. For those hypothetical grandparents, this would’ve been a divorce. For the modern couple, it is not because they did not get married.
What if you get divorced?
It is certainly interesting to look at the ways divorce and marriage have changed over the years, and it is very important for those who are going through a divorce in the modern era to know what legal steps to take. There are many details to sort out to help things go smoothly.
