CLOSING THE DIVORCE DIVIDE - Yahoo! News: "Sixty percent of Americans are married, and 86 percent of the never-married say they hope to be married someday. Ninety-three percent of married Americans say they would marry their spouses over again.
Nonetheless, the proportion of Americans who are in stable, 'very happy' first marriages has dropped 20 percentage points since 1973, according to Glenn's calculations from the General Social Surveys, conducted by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. Delayed marriage, increased divorce, and a slight decline in marital happiness are the reasons.
Who are most likely to be in very happy first marriages? The college-educated are about twice as likely as high school dropouts; the 'very' religious are also about twice as likely as those who are only slightly or not at all religious. People who marry directly without first cohabiting are also about twice as likely to succeed in marriage as those who live together."
