Divorce laws and inequality

Are easy divorce laws to blame for rising income inequality? This question occurred whilst I was reading this paper (pdf).
The theory here is straightforward. If it’s easy to get divorces, rich men will be reluctant to marry poorer women, for fear that these are just gold-diggers out to get a big divorce settlement. They will therefore prefer (ceteris paribus) to marry richer women whom they perceive as less likely to want them just for the money. If divorce is impossible, by contrast, this fear will be absent, as the poorer woman would be unable to get a big settlement.
A relaxation in the divorce laws, therefore, will lead to a rise in assortative mating. At the margin, bosses will be more reluctant to marry their secretaries. They’ll prefer higher-earning women who are less likely to regard them as a meal ticket*.
But, if high earners marry high earners, their children are more likely to inherit skills which make them high earners. By the same token, with low earners marrying low earners, their children are more likely to inherit a lack of earning skills.
In this way, easier divorce laws will, after a generation, lead to greater inequality in skills, and hence to income inequality.
Now, of course, there are other reasons for the rise in assortative mating – not least the fact that there are more high-earning women than there were years ago.
But there is some mixed evidence that assortative mating is a factor in rising inequality and declining social mobility. Insofar as easier divorce laws have contributed to this, they are perhaps therefore a partial cause of increasing inequality.
I reckon there are two lessons here, both awkward for liberal leftists. One is that there are trade-offs between their values: economic equality versus freeing women from bad marriages. Second, there can be adverse long-term consequences of legal change which are genuinely unforeseeable.
* There’s a caveat here. What’s really disastrous for a man is if his wife stops her high-earning career after marriage and then claims compensation for this in a divorce.

Comments

[Chris Williams]

Good point, Chris D - tragically, though, when divorce was nigh-on impossible to get, people still tended to marry others of similar social standing, which usually, though not always, mapped on to financial standing as well.

[Mrs Trellis]

Stimulating as usual. It might also be interesting as I think John Ermisch paper may do if I recall correctly to look at primary and secondary education changes, particularly the contraction of catchtment areas for schools over the last 40 years, on assortive mating.

I would also be very interested if you come across any work on the role of bequests in enabling social mobility - I antcipated finding a lot of research on this but haven't hit the right stream yet.

[james C]

Are you on drugs-what does a divorce settlement have to do with income?

[dearieme]

"if high earners marry high earners, their children are more likely to inherit skills which make them high earners." The inheritance will presumably be nature rather than nurture - the latter coming mainly from the nanny.

[Marcin Tustin]

I'm afraid that you're way off here. The problem is not whether or not divorce is (easily) available, but whether or not the wife (or husband) can easily nab one's assets. In the USA they solve this with pre-nuptial agreements, but on the other side they have weird rules that pool spouses property.

Moreover, you ignore the fact that many couples will now spawn without contracting a legal marriage. For a wealthy couple, putting in the necessary documentation to avoid the inconveniences of that should quite affordable.

[John Freeland]

"But there is some mixed evidence that assortative mating is a factor in rising inequality and declining social mobility."

I doubt such "Romeo and Juliet" marriages where couples from opposite sides of the tracks get together and marry have ever been common. The bigger factor may be that the poor simply reproduce at a higher rate than the well-off do. Any scheme to elevate the poor has to seriously address family planning.

The opportunities for members of diverse socioeconomic strata to interact are likely diminishing. We live in increasingly economically segregated enclaves.

When I was a kid, we lived in a town where there literally was a "tracks" separating neighborhoods of differing family incomes. But, kids went to the same public school, played on the same teams, used the same parks, shopped (mostly) in the same stores downtown, went to the same churches, said hello (or otherwise spoke to each other) on the street. It wasn't free of class-consciousness, but we knew each other, sort of. Isn't it different now?

[Planeshift]

There is another aspect here; Ugly rich men with bad personalities can still get good looking women as wives with easy divorce settlements. The women can claim a share of his wealth after a few years as payment for putting up with him, the man gets a few years of good sex before being able to move onto the younger model.

[How to protect your credit after divorce]

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[james higham]

...At the margin, bosses will be more reluctant to marry their secretaries. They’ll prefer higher-earning women who are less likely to regard them as a meal ticket...

Don't know of too many bosses who'd prefer a high earning woman. These tend to be married to their careers on the whole.

[AntiCitizenOne]

The answer is (obviously) to make marriage much harder.