The joint effects of marriage partners' socioeconomic positions on the risk of divorce

Abstract

This study investigated the joint effects of spouses' socioeconomic positions on the risk of divorce in Finland. For couples in which both partners were at the lowest educational level, the risk of divorce was lower than could be expected on the basis of the previously documented overall inverse association between each spouse's education and the risk of divorce. Women who were employed or were homemakers, and who had employed husbands, had comparatively stable marriages; couples in which the husband, the wife, or both partners were unemployed had an elevated risk of divorce. A husband's high income decreased the risk of divorce, and a wife's high income increased the risk at all levels of the other spouse's income, but especially when the wife's income exceeded the husband's.