America’s flight from marriage laid bare by new study

A new study claims one-in-three young adults in the United States will never marry.

Writing for the Institute for Family Studies (IFS), Lyman Stone said these are close to the lowest levels ever observed for marriage rates.

“Many commentators will blame these declines on the increased delay in marriage. While there’s some truth to this, the situation is extreme at higher ages, too,” he wrote.

“For instance, only about 60 per cent of 35-year-old men are ever-married today, down from 90 per cent in 1980. This trend also suggests that a growing share of Americans will not get married before their healthiest years are long past them,” he continued.

Stone is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Family Studies and Chief Information Officer of the population research firm Demographic Intelligence.

He said it is striking that just 20 per cent of 25-year-old women and 23 per cent of 25-year-old men have ever married today.

“In 1967, about 85 per cent of 25-year-old women had ever married, along with 75 per cent of 25-year-old men. This was the height of the Baby Boom years,” Stone wrote.

He pointed out that these marriages also ended up having the highest divorce rates observed in American history.

Stone also noted the Baby Boomer rates were also unusual: in 1920, he said just 70 per cent of 25-year-old women and 50 per cent of 25-year-old men had ever been married.

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