Does getting married at a younger age help explain the higher divorce rate in red states?
Cahn: Teen marriages are associated with higher rates of divorce. The older you are when you get married, the less likely you are, statistically, to divorce… So when you look at age of first marriage, you see a correlation with divorce rate. And how do you explain people getting married at younger ages in the red states? Cahn: If you’re going to preach abstinence until marriage, it’s not surprising that the result will be a lower age of marriage. Carbone: The educational levels in red states are also lower, with early marriage or childbearing often derailing education, and those who don’t plan to go onto college marrying earlier. Can you talk about some of the economic reasons for marital instability in red families? Cahn: The red model of early marriage works really well if one breadwinner can support his family and where jobs are available and plentiful for high school grads. Unfortunately, that’s not the economy we live in right now. In our economy, the more education you have, in
