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posted by mrpg on Sunday July 30 2017, @05:55PM   Printer-friendly
from the marry-me dept.

You’re not the only one spending fewer summer weekends watching other people get married—but don’t worry, the weddings you’re still invited to might feel a little more special these days.

Fewer Americans are getting married, and the ones who still are have scaled back their weddings. Their nuptials are becoming smaller, though not necessarily cheaper, affairs.

Many couples are waiting longer and longer to schedule their weddings. In 2015, the median first-time American bride was almost 28 years old and the median groom almost 30, according to the most recent data available from the Census Bureau. (Ten years earlier, the typical bride was 25.5, the typical groom 27.)

The U.S. marriage rate—the number of new marriages per 1,000 people—has been falling for decades. It fell especially fast during the recession, in 2008 and 2009, but there’s little evidence that people started getting married again even as the economy recovered. And research firm IbisWorld predicts the marriage rate will keep falling over the next five years.

From a global perspective, that wouldn’t be a surprise. The U.S. marriage rate would need to fall by about a third to reach the marriage rates in other developed countries. The most recent data show a U.S. marriage rate of 6.9, compared with an average rate of 4.6 for countries in the European Union.

Are weaker economics the cause, or has marriage gone out of fashion?


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  • (Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday July 31 2017, @10:12AM

    by Phoenix666 (552) on Monday July 31 2017, @10:12AM (#547071) Journal

    I can identify with that. I didn't have a desire to get married either, and fully expected to never meet anyone who was attractive and bright and just dorky enough to put up with my geeky eccentricities. Then i was at a singles party on the Upper West Side of Manhattan that a friend dragged me to, and while on line to flee the incredibly overcrowded apartment the girl in line next to me commented that the place was like the cantina scene from Mos Eisley. I figured she was worth talking to more and 18 years later i'm still talking to her.

    Being married has been a good thing. Joys are multiplied and sorrows are halved. Makes the journey of life far better than it would have been alone, hacking software in the dark. YMMV

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