People in New Jersey may well have heard or read reports over the years about marriage or divorce rates in the state and across the country. Some of these reports may claim that as many as half of all marriages will result in divorce while others may say that more couples are staying married longer. It can be hard to sort out what is truth and what is fiction in this arena. Sometimes, looking at the hard numbers may provide the best insight of all.
According to data from the 2016 American Community Survey, it is believed that 47.5 percent of all people in the nation who are at least 16 years old are currently married, or were when this survey was conducted last year. Almost 34 percent of people have never been married at all. The percent of people who were listed as divorced was actually 11 percent with another 5.8 percent being identified as widowed and two percent separated.
An interesting fact can be seen when comparing the percent of divorced women who work outside the home to the percent of men who work outside the home. In the former group, 13.4 percent were listed as divorced. Among men, only 9.1 percent were divorced.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provides a view of divorce rates in New Jersey that shows a stable divorce rate for at least four years. From 2012 to 2015, an estimated 2.8 out of every 1,000 residents statewide was divorced. That is down from 2.9 in 2011 and three in 2010 but up from 2.7 in 2009. Numbers for years after 2015 were not yet available.