In some way or another many of us will experience divorce, whether it be in our environment or directly happening to you. According to cdc.gov, as of the most recent data, the divorce rate in the United States is 3.2 per 1,000 people or about 32% of people in the United States. 

“Divorces are decreasing — but marriages are, too, and sometimes that’s not by choice,” said goodhousekeeping.com. “Half of Americans ages 18 and older were married in 2017 … [which] is down 8 percent since 1990.”

Many factors can affect peoples’ decisions to marry as well as divorce. Antioch Community High School psychologist Robin Vlosky, believes that education could be causing lower divorce rates.

“People use to get married a lot younger,” said Vlosky. “The age is increasing. More educated people are still getting married probably at the same rates and people with less education and less income are probably getting married at a lower rate than they used to.”

University of Maryland sociology professor Philip Cohen agrees with Vlosky, adding that there are more people who are making better marriage choices. 

“Many of the people getting married today are more privileged than they used to be and socially and economically stable, all of which bodes well for the survival of their marriages,” Cohen said. 

Divorce rates are dropping due to people with lower income making more educated choices. That doesn’t always mean that they don’t want to divorce, but it makes life easier for both people involved.