The Value of Marriage: Then and Now

Over the past decades, the view of marriage has been sifting. With a high divorce rate, instead of "death to us part" more newlyweds figure if the marriage can't last, the answer to their dilemma is a divorce. It is true that marriages in the 1950s lasted a lot longer, but back then divorces were considered a taboo subject. 

The 1950s

The motives behind marriages of the 1950s consists of the fact that people were expected to start off their lives right after High School. The roles of the husband and wife were simply generic – the husband, being the bread winner of the family, was expected to work and financially support the family while the wife had the stay at home duties of taking care of the children along with cleaning and cooking. Typically, it was custom for girls as young as 19 and boys as young as 21 to get married.

Back then, the divorce rates were 23 percent. Of course that did not mean all marriages in the 50s were happy. People in the 1940s and 1950s believed that divorces were regarded as a deviant behavior and a public acknowledgement of failure.

The Present

In today's marriage, both spouses have to work in order to financially support their family. The average age for people to get married are as young as 27 for men and as young as 25 for women. The motives of marriage have changed since most parents do expect their children to go to college right after high school rather than marry.

The divorce rate is 50 percent which causes some people to wonder if today's society takes marriage seriously. Along with a high divorce rate, there has been a growth of single parent families as well, since the society's views on divorce aren't as strict with it as before.