Assortative Mating and Divorce: Evidence from Austrian Register Data

Arbeitspapier

This paper documents that changes in assortative mating patterns over the last four decades along the dimensions of age, ethnicity, religion and education are not responsible for the increasing marital instability in Austria. Quite the contrary, without the rise in the age at marriage, divorce rates would be considerably higher. Immigration and secularization, and the resulting supply of spouses with diverse ethnicity and religious denominations had no overall effect on divorce rates. Countervailing effects – in line with theoretical predictions – offset each other. The rise in the incidence in divorce is most probably caused by changing social norms.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: NRN Working Paper, NRN: The Austrian Center for Labor Economics and the Analysis of the Welfare State ; No. 0918

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure; Domestic Abuse ; Demographic Trends, Macroeconomic Effects, and Forecasts ; Economics of Minorities, Races, Indigenous Peoples, and Immigrants; Non-labor Discrimination ; Cultural Economics: Religion
• Subject: Assortative mating ; divorce ; marital instability ; immigration

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Frimmel, Wolfgang ; Halla, Martin ; Winter-Ebmer, Rudolf
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Johannes Kepler University Linz, NRN - The Austrian Center for Labor Economics and the Analysis of the Welfare State
• (where): Linz
• (when): 2009

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/115027
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:42 AM CET