America’s marriage rate has been dropping for years — don’t expect Gen Z to change that trend
As marriage rates continue to fall, analysis from Pew Research Center indicates even fewer I do’s in the next generation.
Though the right to marriage is something America’s political system actually agrees on, new research suggests that young people aren’t so wedded to the idea of tying the knot themselves.
Maybe they’re already fretting about the cost, or maybe they’re more concerned about bad grades than bridal parties, but new analysis of survey data from the University of Michigan conducted by Pew Research Center found that high schoolers in the US today are far less likely to express interest in marriage than previous generations.
Indeed, just 67% of 12th graders in 2023 said they were likely to get married one day, compared with the 80% reported three decades before, while the share who said they were most likely to not get married at all nearly doubled to 9% over that period.
This tracks with a long observed decline in US marriage rates, per Census Bureau data cited by USAFacts. At the most recent count, in 2024, the share of married households was only 47.1% — slightly above the all-time low of 46.8% recorded in 2022.
Without a hitch
At the same time, the US is also seeing fewer separations: the number of divorces per 1,000 married women plummeted to 14.4 in 2023, down from its 1980 peak (22.6). So, if messy marriage breakups aren’t as probable, how come young people today are less drawn to going down the aisle?
The same Pew survey found that while the share of boys expressing a desire to marry has remained “virtually unchanged,” girls in 2023 were far less likely to say they thought they’d get married one day than those in 1993 (61% vs. 83%) — which, much like falling birth rates, could be the result of a whole host of personal, political, or pay-related reasons.
