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Rising Inflation and Impacts on Divorce Filings

I read a good article about how inflation and financial issues affect divorce. According to this article Rising Inflation Impacts Annual Divorce Filings


Depending on who you ask, we are either already in a recession or it will soon arrive. Financial distress has a deleterious effect on families. For families facing a lot of personal financial stress, it can fuel marital conflict and instability. Per the article if inflation keeps raging, the writer would expect marriages to be more stable. In 1980, the last time inflation was this high, divorce rates fell as the recession deepened. Double-digit unemployment rates and interest rates as high as 21% meant that couples could not afford to file for divorce. One explanation might be that people were financially unable to divorce due to the shrinking wallets.


Divorce rates had been climbing since the 1960s, when no-fault divorce procedures were signed into law. Previously, petitioners had to prove infidelity, addiction, dangerous behavior, or another fault. During the 2008 financial crisis, economists predicted sky-high divorce rates. It did not happen.


Their research supports the argument that marital commitments tend to be strengthened during harsh economic times. “Using individual-level data from the Census Bureau’s recent Pulse Survey, we show that married respondents are not only less likely to experience mental health problems but also less likely to experience these problems following declines in work-related income and as the economists continue to debate the effect of inflation on divorce rates, many couples seem to be more concerned with simply trying to keep their pantries stocked.

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