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Women's Education and Family Behavior: Trends in Marriage, Divorce and Fertility

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Listed author(s):
  • Adam Isen
  • Betsey Stevenson

Abstract

This paper examines how marital and fertility patterns have changed along racial and educational lines for men and women. Historically, women with more education have been the least likely to marry and have children, but this marriage gap has eroded as the returns to marriage have changed. Marriage and remarriage rates have risen for women with a college degree relative to women with fewer years of education. However, the patterns of, and reasons for, marriage have changed. College educated women marry later, have fewer children, are less likely to view marriage as "financial security", are happier in their marriages and with their family life, and are not only the least likely to divorce, but have had the biggest decrease in divorce since the 1970s compared to women without a college degree. In contrast, there have been fewer changes in marital patterns by education for men.

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File URL: http://www.nber.org/papers/w15725.pdf
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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 15725.

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Date of creation: Feb 2010
Publication status: published as Adam Isen & Betsey Stevenson, 2008. "Women’s Education and Family Behavior: Trends in Marriage, Divorce and Fertility," NBER Chapters, in: Topics in Demography and the Economy National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:15725
Note: CH ED LS
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Find related papers by JEL classification:
  • I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
  • J1 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics
  • J11 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Demographic Trends, Macroeconomic Effects, and Forecasts
  • J12 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure
  • J13 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Fertility; Family Planning; Child Care; Children; Youth
  • J15 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants; Non-labor Discrimination
  • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination

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  17. Ronald Rindfuss & S. Morgan & Kate Offutt, 1996. "Education and the changing age pattern of American fertility: 1963–1989," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 33(3), pages 277-290, August.
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