Urban Areas by Divorced Persons as Percent of Population, 2024

[dimondpark]

Honestly, these numbers don't seem high to me, I thought they'd be much higher given what we hear and read in the media about this subject, but maybe those are rates of divorce for people that have been married, but this is the total proportion of persons in urban areas.

US Urban Areas by Divorced Persons as Percent of Population, 2024:
15.7%--Lawton, OK
15.2%--Columbus, GA-AL
15.1%--Amarillo, TX
15.0%--Shreveport, LA
14.8%--Albuquerque, NM
14.7%--Norwich-New London, CT
14.6%--Topeka, KS
14.4%--Killeen, TX
14.4%--Pensacola, FL
14.3%--Gulfport-Biloxi, MS
14.2%--Daytona Beach-Palm Coast-Port Orange, FL
14.2%--Dothan, AL
14.1%--Youngstown, OH
13.5%--Chattanooga, TN-GA
13.5%--Louisville, KY
13.5%--Spokane, WA
13.4%--Barnstable Town, MA
13.3%--Flint, MI
13.2%--Cape Coral, FL
13.2%--Lorain-Elyria, OH
13.2%--Navarre-Miramar Beach-Destin, FL
13.1%--Mobile, AL
13.0%--Fayetteville, NC
12.9%--Little Rock, AR
12.8%--Huntington, WV-KY
12.8%--Las Vegas, NV
12.7%--Lakeland, FL
12.5%--Bradenton-Sarasota-Venice, FL
12.5%--Eugene, OR
12.5%--Nampa, ID
12.5%--Palm Bay-Melbourne, FL
12.5%--Rockford, IL
12.5%--Tampa-St Petersburg, FL
12.4%--Ft Wayne, IN
12.4%--Tulsa, OK
12.3%--Boise, ID
12.3%--Miami-Ft Lauderdale, FL
12.3%--Port St Lucie, FL
12.3%--Springfield, MO
12.2%--Bremerton, WA
12.2%--Oklahoma City, OK
12.2%--Erie, PA
12.2%--Peoria, IL
12.2%--South Bend, IN-MI
12.1%--Akron, OH
12.1%--Toledo, OH-MI
12.1%--Virginia Beach-Norfolk, VA
12.0%--Canton, OH
12.0%--Jacksonville, FL
12.0%--Lexington-Fayette, KY
11.9%--Davenport, IA-IL
11.9%--Reno, NV
11.9%--Winter Haven, FL
11.8%--Cleveland, OH
11.8%--Tucson, AZ
11.7%--Dayton, OH
11.6%--Salem, OR
11.5%--Anchorage, AK
11.5%--Augusta, GA
11.5%--Jackson, MS
11.5%--Savannah, GA
11.4%--Montgomery, AL
11.3%--Roanoke, VA
11.2%--Kansas City, MO-KS
11.2%--Wichita, KS
11.1%--Appleton, WI
11.1%--Kennewick-Richland-Pasco, WA
11.1%--Lubbock, TX
11.1%--New Haven, CT
11.1%--New Orleans, LA
11.0%--Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, AZ
11.0%--Portland, OR-WA
11.0%--Scranton, PA
10.8%--Binghamton, NY
10.8%--Colorado Springs, CO
10.8%--Des Moines, IA
10.8%--Harrisburg, PA
10.8%--Hartford, CT
10.8%--Indianapolis, IN
10.8%--Memphis, TN
10.8%--Richmond, VA
10.8%--Round Lake-McHenry-Grayslake, IL-WI
10.8%--St Louis, MO-IL
10.7%--Cincinnati, OH-KY
10.7%--Columbus, OH
10.7%--Denver, CO
10.7%--Huntsville, AL
10.7%--Orlando, FL
10.7%--Poughkeepsie-Newburgh, NY
10.6%--Springfield, MA-CT
10.6%--Syracuse, NY
10.5%--Albany-Schenectady, NY
10.5%--Detroit, MI
10.5%--Green Bay, WI
10.5%--Milwaukee, WI
10.5%--Winston-Salem, NC
10.4%--Myrtle Beach-North Myrtle Beach, SC-NC
10.4%--Providence, RI-MA
10.4%--San Antonio, TX
10.3%--Knoxville, TN
10.3%--Reading, PA
10.3%--Rochester, NY
10.2%--Buffalo, NY
10.2%--Indio-Palm Desert-Palm Springs, CA
10.2%--Omaha, NE-IA
10.2%--Santa Rosa, CA
10.2%--York, PA
10.1%--Asheville, NC
10.1%--Atlanta, GA
10.1%--Baton Rouge, LA
10.1%--Corpus Christi, TX
10.1%--El Paso, TX
10.1%--Salt Lake City, UT
10.0%--Baltimore, MD
10.0%--Birmingham, AL
10.0%--Columbia, SC
9.9%---Minneapolis-St Paul, MN
9.9%---Nashville, TN
9.9%---Phoenix West-Goodyear-Avondale, AZ
9.9%---Wilmington, NC
9.8%---Fayetteville-Springdale-Rogers, AR-MO
9.8%---Modesto, CA
9.8%---Sacramento, CA
9.8%---Seattle-Tacoma, WA
9.7%---Bonita Springs-Estero, FL
9.7%---Dallas-Ft Worth-Arlington, TX
9.7%---Durham, NC
9.7%---Grand Rapids, MI
9.7%---Greenville, SC
9.7%---Mission Viejo-Lake Forest-Laguna Niguel, CA
9.7%---Ogden-Layton, UT
9.7%---Worcester, MA-CT
9.6%---Ft Collins, CO
9.6%---Greensboro, NC
9.6%---San Diego, CA
9.6%---Vallejo, CA
9.5%---Allentown-Bethlehem, PA-NJ
9.5%---Lincoln, NE
9.4%---Austin, TX
9.4%---Lansing, MI
9.4%---Pittsburgh, PA
9.3%---Oxnard-Ventura, CA
9.1%---Bakersfield, CA
9.1%---Palmdale-Lancaster, CA
9.1%---Temecula-Murrieta-Menifee, CA
9.1%---The Woodlands, TX
9.0%---Honolulu, HI
9.0%---Raleigh, NC
8.9%---Madison, WI
8.9%---Philadelphia, PA-NJ-DE-MD
8.8%---Bridgeport-Stamford, CT-NY
8.8%---Concord, NC
8.8%---Victorville-Hesperia-Apple Valley, CA
8.7%---Atlantic City-Ocean City-Villas, NJ
8.7%---Denton-Lewisville, TX
8.7%---Lancaster-Manheim, PA
8.6%---Concord-Walnut Creek, CA
8.6%---Chicago, IL-IN
8.6%---Fresno, CA
8.6%---Trenton, NJ
8.5%---Charlotte, NC-SC
8.5%---Houston, TX
8.5%---Kissimmee-St Cloud, FL
8.4%---Boston, MA-NH
8.2%---McAllen, TX
8.2%---McKinney-Frisco, TX
8.2%---Washington-Arlington, DC-VA-MD
8.1%---Kailua(Honolulu County), HI
8.1%---Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA
8.1%---Riverside-San Bernardino, CA
8.1%---Stockton, CA
7.9%---New York-Newark, NY-NJ
7.9%---San Francisco-Oakland, CA
7.7%---Ann Arbor, MI
7.6%---Antioch, CA
7.4%---Brownsville, TX
6.9%---Laredo, TX
6.5%---San Jose, CA
4.7%---Provo-Orem, UT

source: data.census.gov
Table S1201 Marital Status

[eschaton]

Divorce rates aren't actually that high.

The old chestnut that "50% of marriages end in divorce" is technically true, but doesn't take into account that some people get married more than once. Meaning that those 50% of marriages are less than 50% of the population.

The true number is more like 33% of those who have ever been married ended up getting divorced. For first marriages eventually 41% get divorced. For second marriages, it's 60%, and for third, 73%.

Divorce rates have been falling from their all-time-high in the 1980s, in large part because serial monogamy outside of marriage is now acceptable outside of evangelicals (and less people are getting married in general).

It's not surprising though that divorce rates remain higher in more "red" metropolitan areas, where it's still more normal to get married young. One of the highest correlations with lower divorce rates, after all, is higher levels of education/older age at first marriage.

[montréaliste]

@eschaton/

Well put.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by eschaton

The old chestnut that "50% of marriages end in divorce" is technically true, but doesn't take into account that some people get married more than once. Meaning that those 50% of marriages are less than 50% of the population.

My mom is one of six kids. She and 4 of her siblings have only been married once, and have remained married for the duration of their adulthoods.

The 6th sibling has been married and subsequently divorced 4 seperate times.

That generation of her family produced 9 marriages, with 4 of them ending in divorce, but all 4 of those divorces were just her older brother. As individuals they have an 83% marriage success rate.

[JManc]

Granted life happens, people get married for the wrong reasons and to the wrong people but 33% is still pretty damn high.

[SIGSEGV]

It might make sense to rank ratio of divorced to married?

[wwmiv]

My guess why the number is so low:

Sub-18s are typically ~20% (so… not married)
18-24 ~10% (so… usually not married)
24-34 ~15% (so… ~half married but not yet to the point of lots of divorces—and first marriages are the likeliest to last, so that depresses the rate in this group further)

That’s already 45% of the population automatically deducted from the denominator.

Let’s assume for argument sake that typical marriage rate at any given moment for 18+ is 50/50 and that the average divorce rate across all marriages (first or otherwise) is also 50/50.

In that case, you would expect roughly:

55% × 50% × 50% = 13.75%

...which is almost exactly where all of these metro areas fall.

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by eschaton

It's not surprising though that divorce rates remain higher in more "red" metropolitan areas, where it's still more normal to get married young. One of the highest correlations with lower divorce rates, after all, is higher levels of education/older age at first marriage.

First marriages are the likeliest to NOT end in divorce, but age at the time of that marriage does matter: marriages 18-24 have high divorce rates, but so do marriages after 35. Marriages in the 24-35 years are comparatively successful and that’s what driving the age of first marriage statistics.

While comparatively younger at age of first marriage than other regions, southern states (as do all states) have a median age of first marriage firmly within the 24-35 range.

And I’m also not really seeing a geographic pattern in this data:

South:
median—Richmond/Memphis @ 10.8%
high—Lawton @ 15.7%
low—Laredo @ 6.9%

Midwest:
median—Appleton @ 11.1%
high—Topeka @ 14.6%
low—Ann Arbor @ 7.7%

Northeast:
median—Reading/Rochester @ 10.3%
high—Norwich @ 14.7%
low—New York @ 7.9%

West:
median—Sacramento/Seattle @ 9.8%
high—Albuquerque @ 14.8%
low—Provo-Orem @ 4.7%

Other examples of low divorce southern metros, if you want something “culturally southern”:
• McKinney-Frisco @ 8.2%
• Houston @ 8.5%
• Charlotte @ 8.5%
• Denton-Lewisville @ 8.7%
• Concord @ 8.8%

And weighted averages for each region almost perfectly reflect the medians, so no region’s distributions is biased. Yeah, these numbers might be statistically significant, but are they meaningful differences? Not really.

[Six Corners]

So if you’re middle-aged or thereabout and looking for singles ready to mingle, current hotspots are Lawton Oklahoma, Columbus, Georgia, and Amarillo, Texas.