OVER 50’S DIVORCE RATE SOARS

Divorce rates among the over 50’s have soared dramatically over the last few years, creating a new generation of ‘silver singletons’ about town.

While the divorce rate drops among all other age groups, the rate of separations between couples in their 50s and 60s continues to rise.

The number of over-60s getting divorced is at its highest on record, with 1 out of 4 divorces registered now in the UK involving couples over the age of 50.

However, the ONS (Office of National Statistics) has found that this increase has little or nothing to do with length of marriage: The most likely explanation for the rise is due to the steadily increasing age at marriage since the late 1960s.

To illustrate this, the average woman who married in 1975 aged 23 would now be reaching 60, after 37 years of marriage, one year earlier than women who married a decade earlier in 1965. The average man who married in 1978 aged 26 would now be reaching 60, after 34 years of marriage, two years earlier than men who married in 1968.

The conclusion is that sadly, those born between 1946 and 1964 will be the first generation for which living alone in old age may be the norm thanks to the rising divorce rate as revealed by marriage guidance authority Relate.