Thursday, November 27, 2008

A divorce calulator?

If you think America's divorce rate is 50 percent, you're not alone. But you are wrong, according to Betsey Stevenson, assistant professor of business and public policy at University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School.
The good news is that the divorce rate has been falling in the United States since 1979 and couples marrying today are less likely to divorce compared to their parents' generation.
"The ubiquitous 50 percent divorce rate is unlikely to ever be true for those who married in the past few decades," Stevenson said.
"For many of these folks, their divorce rates so far have fallen substantially compared with previous generations." But Stevenson notes that these broad facts hide as much as they reveal.
"Different types of people face different divorce rates historically." Your chances of divorce lessen the more education you have. And the younger you marry, the greater your likelihood of divorcing.

To help people understand how divorce differs based on factors like education, age of marriage, and the era in which you married, Stevenson -- in partnership with divorce360.com -- developed The Marriage Calculator
www.divorce360.com/content/divorcecalculator.aspx to show these differences to the public. Moreover, this calculator lets people see how the incidence of divorce evolves throughout the life of a marriage.

The calculator uses data from the U.S. Census bureau to allow users to compare themselves to others who married about the same time period, have a similar education and have been married as long as you. With the marriage calculator, you can find out how many people with similar backgrounds have divorced. In addition, it estimates how many people like you are likely to get divorced in the next five years.