It is evident that higher standards of taste and higher standards of
morality may also operate under certain circumstances to render the
family life unstable in a similar way.
(7) Directly connected with these last mentioned causes is another
cause,--the higher age of marriage. Some have thought that a low age of
marriage was more prolific in divorces than a relatively high age of
marriage. But a low age of marriage cannot be a cause of the increase of
divorce in the United States, because the proportion of immature
marriages in this country is steadily lessening, that is, the age of
marriage is steadily increasing, and all must admit that along with the
higher age of marriage has gone increasing divorce; and there may
possibly be some connection between the two facts. As we have already
seen, the higher standards of living make later marriage necessary. Men
in the professions do not think of marriage nowadays until thirty, or
until they have an independent income. Now, how may the higher age of
marriage possibly increase the instability of the family? It may do so
in this way.
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