Divorce Laws and Divorce Rate in the U.S.

At the end of the 1960s, the U.S. divorce laws underwent major changes and the divorce rate more than doubled in all of the states. The new laws introduced unilateral divorce in most of the states and changes in divorce settlements in every state, such as property division, alimony transfers, and child custody assignments. The empirical literature so far has focused on the switch from consensual to unilateral divorce and found that this change cannot fully account for the increase in the divorce rate. Also, the divorce rate increased even in states where the decision remained consensual. In this paper, I consider the effects of other aspects of the legal change. I show that changes in divorce settlements provide economic incentives for both spouses to agree to divorce. Moreover, I describe a mechanism that can explain the different change in divorce rate by age of couples. I solve and calibrate a model where agents differ by gender, and make decisions on their marital status, investment and labor supply. Under the new financial settlements, divorced men gain from a favorable division of property, while women gain from an increase in alimony and child support transfers. Since both of them are better off in the new divorce setting, the existing requirement of consent for divorce (consensual or unilateral) is no longer relevant. Results show that changes in divorce settlements account for a substantial amount of the increase in the aggregate divorce rate. I also find that the increase in divorce rate of young couples with children contributes the most to the overall increase, which is consistent with the data.Age-specific divorce rate, unilateral and consensual divorce, divorce laws, property division, alimony and child support, child custody

Does Divorce Law Matter?

In this paper we derive an explicit model of negotiations between spouses when utility is (partially) transferable only in case of separation. We show that inefficient separation may occur in equilibrium even under consensual divorce law. This provides theoretical support for the view that changes in social norms rather than in legislation may be responsible for increasing divorce rates.Bargaining, Divorce, Non transferability

Divorce decisions, divorce laws and social norms

This article focuses on the three way relationship between change in divorce law, evolution of divorce rate and evolution of the cultural acceptance of divorce. We consider a heterogeneous population in which individuals differ in terms of the subjective loss they suffer when divorced, this loss being associated with stigmatizing social norms. The proportion of each type of individual evolves endogenously through a cultural transmission process. Divorce law is chosen by majority voting between two alternatives : mutual consent and unilateral divorce. In this framework, evolutions of divorce rate and divorce law may be jointly affected by the cultural dynamics within the society. In particular, we are able to reproduce the fact that divorce rate often raises before a legislation change. Indeed, the shift from consensual to unilateral divorce has an accelerating effect on the increase in divorce rate but is not the driving force behind this evolution.Marriage and divorce, divorce legislation, cultural evolution, social norms.

Divorce laws and divorce rate in the U.S

At the end of the 1960s, the U.S. divorce laws underwent major changes and the divorce rate more than doubled in all of the states. The new laws introduced unilateral divorce in most of the states, and changes in divorce settlements, such as property division and child custody assignments in every state. Empirical literature has focused on the switch from consensual to unilateral divorce and found that this change cannot fully account for the increase in the divorce rate. What previous literature has ignored is other aspects of the legal change, and their effect on divorce rate in states where the decision remained consensual. In this paper I show that changes in divorce settlements provide economic incentives for both spouses to agree on divorcing. I solve and calibrate a model where agents differ by gender, and wages, and make marital status, investment, and labor supply decisions. Under the new financial settlements, divorced men gain from a favorable division of property, while women gain from an increase in joint child custody assignments. Since both of them are better off in the new divorce setting, the requirement of consent for divorce is not longer necessary. Results show that changes in divorce settlements account for a substantial amount of the increase in the divorce rate in both the unilateral and the consensual regime. I also find that the increase in divorce rate of young couples with children contributes the most in the overall increase, and this is consistent with the data

Does Divorce Law Matter?

In this paper we derive an explicit model of negotiations between spouses when utility is (partially) transferable only in case of separation. We show that inefficient separation may occur in equilibrium even under consensual divorce law. This provides theoretical support for the view that changes in social norms rather than in legislation may be responsible for increasing divorce rates

Until Death Do Us Part? The economics of short-term marriage contracts

"Until death do us part". Common wisdom considers that marriages will last forever, as the default length of a marriage is the total remaining lifespan of the spouses. This paper aims at questioning the prevailing marriage contracts, by exploring the conditions under which short-term contracts would be more desirable. Using a two-period collective household model, we show that, under a large interval of values for household production technology parameters and individual preference parameters, short-term marriage contracts, if available, would dominate long-term contracts. Moreover, the recent equalization of bargaining power within the household is shown to make short-term contracts even more desirable than in the past.marriage contracts ; collective household model ; length of marriage ; household production technology

Stoning in Iran: A Sexist and Overlooked Practice

This paper seeks to dissect and expose the ancient practice of stoning in Iran, and to analyze the injustices that are built into this punishment

Changes in educational assortative mating in contemporary Spain

This article analyses patterns and trends in educational assortative mating of the Spanish women born between 1920 and 1969 using data from the 2001 Spanish Census. By means of loglinear models we examine the following issues: i) intensity and changes in educational assortative mating patterns; ii) crossing barriers across educational thresholds and iii) degree of symmetry between male and female patterns. Results show that education matters in the composition of unions: people tend to marry assortatively according to their education. However this pattern clearly differs across cohorts and between educational groups, being higher for the extreme categories. The most notable trends are 1) the increasing intensity of homogamy among the more educated and 2) the incipient extinction of the traditional female hypergamic pattern.2001 Census, assortative mating, educational attainment, marriage, Spain

Residential mobility and migration of the separated

Separation is known to have a disruptive effect on the housing careers of those involved, mainly because a decrease in resources causes (temporary) downward moves on the housing ladder. Little is known about the geographies of the residential mobility behaviour of the separated. Applying a hazard analysis to retrospective life-course data for the Netherlands, we investigate three hypotheses: individuals who experienced separation move more often than do steady singles and people in intact couple relationships, they are less likely to move over long distances, and they move more often to cities than people in intact couple relationships. The results show that separation leads to an increase in mobility, to moves over short distance for men with children, and to a prevalence of the city as a destination of moves.divorce, family dynamics, gender, hazard analysis, internal migration, longitudinal analysis, Netherlands, retrospective data, separation, spatial mobility