Arkansas marriage rates level while nation sees uptick
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Americans are getting married slightly more often than before the pandemic, while the U.S. divorce rate continues its decades-long slide.
Why it matters: Fewer Americans are marrying than a generation ago. But those who do increasingly come from groups whose marriages are more likely to last.
Zoom in: The marriage rate in Arkansas — still higher than the nation's — remained the same three years in a row at 7.9 per 1,000 people. The divorce rate flunctuated from 3.5 in 2022, down to 3 in 2023 and up to 3.3 in 2024.
By the numbers: The U.S. marriage rate rose to 6.3 per 1,000 people in 2024, slightly above 2019's pre-pandemic rate of 6.1, per the latest CDC data.
- Meanwhile, the divorce rate fell to 2.3.
Yes, but: This falling divorce rate partly reflects the fact that fewer Americans are married in the first place.
- But that doesn't explain the entire decline: The annual rate among only married Americans fell to about 13 divorces per 1,000 in 2024 from about 19 in 2008, according to an Axios analysis of CDC and census data.
Between the lines: Part of that decline comes down to who gets married, Pew Research Center research associate Jake Hays tells Axios.
- "Over time, the married population has shifted toward adults with higher levels of education," said Hays, who studies social and demographic trends.
- More-educated adults tend to marry later and have greater economic stability, both linked to lower divorce rates.
Reality check: The widely predicted post-lockdown divorce wave never materialized nationally, though Hays cautions researchers can't know for sure what rates would have looked like without the pandemic.
The bottom line: Americans remain less likely to marry than they were two decades ago. But those who say "I do" might be making the choice more deliberately, and are divorcing at lower rates once they do.