I listened to a story on NPR a couple days ago about a how high divorce rates and teen-pregnancy rates are correlated to the state’s political ideology. Republican states have significantly more divorce and teen pregnancy. In fact, as a whole, the US divorce rate has been holding steady since the mid-90s, while the “red state” divorce rates (and teen-pregnancy rates) continue to rise. That means the blue states make up the difference and their rates are falling. NPR speculated that it’s because in family-values states, people get married earlier because of social pressure or so they can have sex, but choose badly because they don’t know themselves as well as they would several years later, when Democrats tend to get married. They also note that states that are swinging Democratic, like New Hampshire, are starting to have less divorce and teen pregnancy too.
It makes some sense, though I wouldn’t have guessed it. There are a couple of things not made explicit in the story that I wonder about. First, I wonder if the Republican fixation on “family values” issues is being driven by this phenomenon; to someone living in a Republican state, divorce and teen pregnancy are really pressing issues, because their ideology and behavior are not matching up. It could even be a vicious cycle: Values driving divorce driving values…. Second, I wonder how much of this has to do with money. Social class, really. Red states tend to be poorer, and poverty puts serious stress on a marriage. And poverty is correlated with a lot of other stressors, like substance abuse, domestic violence, and child abuse. Also, they mention that the demographic whose divorce rates are dropping the most are women who have graduated from college. I’ve been attending a state university for a few years now, and I can tell you that it’s not full of poor people. These kids (‘ parents) have money.
Nathen's Miraculous Escape 
May 12, 2010 at 4:07 pm
This is really interesting. Makes sense, but I would have guessed that it would to trend in the other direction.
May 14, 2010 at 3:14 pm
I think the “Religious Right” has even more reason for fixation.
When I last looked at the statistics a decade ago, people that claimed to be devout Christians had the same rate of “been divorced” as the general population. But it was also true that they had many fewer divorces after becoming devout.
In other words, something “worked” for them after their divorce. Either their new faith brought them beneficial change or whatever circumstances and personal growth prompted their change in faith also helped them mature before remarriage.
Since they are enjoying happier marriages they naturally want other people to enjoy happier marriages–they have personal reasons to believe this is possible.
Being normally silly Americans, they decide that as useful way to share their hope and joy is to ask the government to encourage or mandate their cause.
True, this was not what helped them. But they either do not realize that or see politics as a nicer alternative (I had to learn things the hard way, but you can benefit by merely acting on what I learned).
May 14, 2010 at 9:46 pm
Interesting. I had thought of Republican states as more Christian than Democratic states, but that’s another counter-intuitive element of this story, as religion is a resiliency factor for marriages.