Growing More Equal and Growing Apart? Socioeconomic Status and the Rise of Divorce in Sweden
(2020) In Lund Papers in Economic Demography (LPED)- Abstract
- A negative association between socioeconomic status (SES) and divorce has been established for most Western nations after 1960, yet we know little about this relationship further back in time when divorce was rare. In low divorce contexts, we expect a positive association between SES and divorce because higher social strata are better equipped to overcome barriers to divorce. According to socioeconomic growth theory, this relationship reverses with
industrialization and modernization since the economic and normative barriers to divorce diminish for many. We investigate SES and other micro-level determinants of divorce among men and women in Sweden, 1880-1960, making use of longitudinal data from parish registers covering Västerbotten... (More) - A negative association between socioeconomic status (SES) and divorce has been established for most Western nations after 1960, yet we know little about this relationship further back in time when divorce was rare. In low divorce contexts, we expect a positive association between SES and divorce because higher social strata are better equipped to overcome barriers to divorce. According to socioeconomic growth theory, this relationship reverses with
industrialization and modernization since the economic and normative barriers to divorce diminish for many. We investigate SES and other micro-level determinants of divorce among men and women in Sweden, 1880-1960, making use of longitudinal data from parish registers covering Västerbotten County. Results confirm a positive association between SES and divorce, which shifted to a negative association among couples who divorced from the mid-1930s onwards. This reversal resulted in an increase in the divorce rate as it extended to broader layers of the population. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/c4d0c6a1-1d5d-421d-b963-19946d830ff0
- author
- Sandström, Glenn and Stanfors, Maria LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2020
- type
- Working paper/Preprint
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- socioeconomic status (SES), divorce, Sweden, modernization, female independence, event history analysis
- in
- Lund Papers in Economic Demography (LPED)
- issue
- 2020:4
- pages
- 46 pages
- project
- A century of divorce. Economic change and union dissolution in Sweden, 1915–2015
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- c4d0c6a1-1d5d-421d-b963-19946d830ff0
- alternative location
- https://www.ed.lu.se/media/ed/papers/working_papers/LPED_2020_4.pdf
- date added to LUP
- 2020-04-27 11:10:31
- date last changed
- 2022-09-01 18:33:13
@misc{c4d0c6a1-1d5d-421d-b963-19946d830ff0, abstract = {{A negative association between socioeconomic status (SES) and divorce has been established for most Western nations after 1960, yet we know little about this relationship further back in time when divorce was rare. In low divorce contexts, we expect a positive association between SES and divorce because higher social strata are better equipped to overcome barriers to divorce. According to socioeconomic growth theory, this relationship reverses with <br/>industrialization and modernization since the economic and normative barriers to divorce diminish for many. We investigate SES and other micro-level determinants of divorce among men and women in Sweden, 1880-1960, making use of longitudinal data from parish registers covering Västerbotten County. Results confirm a positive association between SES and divorce, which shifted to a negative association among couples who divorced from the mid-1930s onwards. This reversal resulted in an increase in the divorce rate as it extended to broader layers of the population.}}, author = {{Sandström, Glenn and Stanfors, Maria}}, keywords = {{socioeconomic status (SES); divorce; Sweden; modernization; female independence; event history analysis}}, language = {{eng}}, note = {{Working Paper}}, number = {{2020:4}}, series = {{Lund Papers in Economic Demography (LPED)}}, title = {{Growing More Equal and Growing Apart? Socioeconomic Status and the Rise of Divorce in Sweden}}, url = {{https://www.ed.lu.se/media/ed/papers/working_papers/LPED_2020_4.pdf}}, year = {{2020}}, }