Gray divorces growing

NY Times -   Rates of “gray divorce” — splits among those 50 and older — have risen sharply in the United States, doubling between 1990 and 2010. Though those rates have stabilized since the pandemic, nearly 40 percent of divorces today occur between people 50 and older.

While divorce rates have been dropping across age groups in recent years, the exception to that trend is among Americans ages 65 and up. The reasons are complicated, but it’s becoming clear that some Gen Xers and baby boomers are increasingly unwilling to stay in what sociologists call “empty-shell marriages.”

These are relationships in which there is no real connection or vitality, where one or both partners are not happy, said Susan Brown, a professor of sociology at Bowling Green State University who co-directs the National Center for Family and Marriage Research. Traditionally, such couples often decided to stay together for the sake of their kids, in view of economic stability or out of fear of stigma.

... Longer life spans are driving older people’s decisions to divorce, said Justin Garcia, the executive director of the Kinsey Institute in Bloomington, Ind., and the author of “The Intimate Animal: The Science of Sex, Fidelity, and Why We Live and Die for Love.”

“We as a species are in longer relationships than our ancestors ever were,” he said. “Lifelong monogamy maybe meant a few decades.” Now, though, there are couples who have been together for 50, 60 or even 70-plus years.  “That is evolutionarily unprecedented for our species,” Dr. Garcia said.