IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/labeco/v38y2016icp90-105.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Divorce: What does learning have to do with it?

Author

Listed:
  • Marinescu, Ioana

Abstract

Learning about marriage quality has been proposed as a key mechanism for explaining how the probability of divorce evolves with marriage duration, and why people often cohabit before getting married. I develop four theoretical models of divorce, three of which include learning. I use data from the Survey of Income and Program Participation to test reduced form implications of these models. The data is inconsistent with models including a substantial amount of learning. On the other hand, the data is consistent with a model without any learning, but where marriage quality changes over time.

Suggested Citation

  • Marinescu, Ioana, 2016. "Divorce: What does learning have to do with it?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(C), pages 90-105.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:labeco:v:38:y:2016:i:c:p:90-105
    DOI: 10.1016/j.labeco.2016.01.002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0927537116000038
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.labeco.2016.01.002?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Steffen Reinhold, 2010. "Reassessing the link between premarital cohabitation and marital instability," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 47(3), pages 719-733, August.
    2. Michael J. Brien & Lee A. Lillard & Steven Stern, 2006. "Cohabitation, Marriage, And Divorce In A Model Of Match Quality," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 47(2), pages 451-494, May.
    3. Gibbons, Robert & Katz, Lawrence F, 1991. "Layoffs and Lemons," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(4), pages 351-380, October.
    4. Lisa B. Kahn & Fabian Lange, 2014. "Employer Learning, Productivity, and the Earnings Distribution: Evidence from Performance Measures," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 81(4), pages 1575-1613.
    5. Farber, Henry S, 1994. "The Analysis of Interfirm Worker Mobility," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 12(4), pages 554-593, October.
    6. Gregory D. Hess, 2004. "Marriage and Consumption Insurance: What's Love Got to Do with It?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(2), pages 290-318, April.
    7. Weiss, Yoram & Willis, Robert J, 1997. "Match Quality, New Information, and Marital Dissolution," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 15(1), pages 293-329, January.
    8. Abbring, Jaap H. & van den Berg, Gerard J., 2003. "A Simple Procedure for the Evaluation of Treatment Effects on Duration Variables," IZA Discussion Papers 810, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Daniel Sullivan & Till von Wachter, 2009. "Job Displacement and Mortality: An Analysis Using Administrative Data," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(3), pages 1265-1306.
    10. Jovanovic, Boyan, 1979. "Job Matching and the Theory of Turnover," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 87(5), pages 972-990, October.
    11. Kelly Bedard & Olivier Deschênes, 2005. "Sex Preferences, Marital Dissolution, and the Economic Status of Women," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 40(2).
    12. Ioana Marinescu, 2009. "Job Security Legislation and Job Duration: Evidence from the United Kingdom," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 27(3), pages 465-486, July.
    13. Jaap H. Abbring, 2012. "Mixed Hitting‐Time Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 80(2), pages 783-819, March.
    14. Mortensen, Dale & Pissarides, Christopher, 2011. "Job Creation and Job Destruction in the Theory of Unemployment," Ekonomicheskaya Politika / Economic Policy, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, vol. 1, pages 1-19.
    15. Mari Rege & Kjetil Telle & Mark Votruba, 2007. "Plant Closure and Marital Dissolution," Discussion Papers 514, Statistics Norway, Research Department.
    16. Gautier, Pieter A. & Svarer, Michael & Teulings, Coen N., 2010. "Marriage and the city: Search frictions and sorting of singles," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 206-218, March.
    17. Gunter J. Hitsch & Ali Hortaçsu & Dan Ariely, 2010. "Matching and Sorting in Online Dating," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 130-163, March.
    18. Shane Frederick & George Loewenstein & Ted O'Donoghue, 2002. "Time Discounting and Time Preference: A Critical Review," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(2), pages 351-401, June.
    19. William Axinn & Arland Thornton, 1992. "The relationship between cohabitation and divorce: Selectivity or causal influence?," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 29(3), pages 357-374, August.
    20. Lee Lillard & Michael Brien & Linda Waite, 1995. "Premarital cohabitation and subsequent marital," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 32(3), pages 437-457, August.
    21. Michael Svarer, 2004. "Is Your Love in Vain? Another Look at Premarital Cohabitation and Divorce," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 39(2).
    22. Jaap H. Abbring & Jeffrey R. Campbell, 2005. "A Firm's First Year," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 05-046/3, Tinbergen Institute.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Landaud, Fanny, 2021. "From employment to engagement? Stable jobs, temporary jobs, and cohabiting relationships," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    2. Edith Aguirre, 2019. "The (non) impact of education on marital dissolution," Discussion Papers 19/15, Department of Economics, University of York.
    3. Raphaela Hyee, 2011. "Do Marriage Markets Influence the Divorce Hazard?," Working Papers 685, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    4. Fabio Blasutto, 2024. "Cohabitation vs. Marriage: Mating Strategies by Education in The USA," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 22(4), pages 1723-1761.
    5. Jiaping Zhang & Mingwang Cheng & Xinyu Wei & Xiaomei Gong, 2018. "Does Mobile Phone Penetration Affect Divorce Rate? Evidence from China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(10), pages 1-19, October.
    6. Petra Persson, 2020. "Social Insurance and the Marriage Market," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(1), pages 252-300.
    7. Laura Turner & Aloysius Siow & Gueorgui Kambourov, 2014. "Relationship Skills in the Labor and Marriage Markets," 2014 Meeting Papers 155, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    8. Jennifer Klein, 2017. "House Price Shocks and Individual Divorce Risk in the United States," Journal of Family and Economic Issues, Springer, vol. 38(4), pages 628-649, December.
    9. Giorgio Gronchi & Elena Parilina & Alessandro Tampieri, 2021. "Plenty of Fish in the Sea: Divorce Choice and the Quality of Singles," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 9(23), pages 1-33, November.
    10. Xu, Yan, 2017. "Essays on preference formation and home production," Other publications TiSEM b028fd7e-53ba-4ff6-97eb-4, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    11. Raphaela Hyee, 2011. "Do Marriage Markets Influence the Divorce Hazard?," Working Papers 685, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Drewianka, Scott, 2006. "A generalized model of commitment," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 52(3), pages 233-251, December.
    2. Laurens Cherchye & Bram De Rock & Frederic Vermeulen & Selma Walther, 2021. "Where did it go wrong? Marriage and divorce in Malawi," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 12(2), pages 505-545, May.
    3. Christine Schnor, 2014. "The Effect of Union Status at First Childbirth on Union Stability: Evidence from Eastern and Western Germany," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 30(2), pages 129-160, May.
    4. Peter Fallesen & Richard Breen, 2016. "Temporary Life Changes and the Timing of Divorce," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 53(5), pages 1377-1398, October.
    5. Roberto Impicciatore & Francesco C. Billari, 2012. "Secularization, Union Formation Practices, and Marital Stability: Evidence from Italy [Sécularisation, Pratiques de Mise en Union et Stabilité des Mariages: Le Cas de l’Italie]," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 28(2), pages 119-138, May.
    6. Fabio Blasutto, 2024. "Cohabitation vs. Marriage: Mating Strategies by Education in The USA," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 22(4), pages 1723-1761.
    7. Svarer, Michael, "undated". "Determinants of Divorce in Denmark," Economics Working Papers 2002-19, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    8. Audrey Light & Yoshiaki Omori, 2013. "Determinants of Long-Term Unions: Who Survives the “Seven Year Itch”?," Population Research and Policy Review, Springer;Southern Demographic Association (SDA), vol. 32(6), pages 851-891, December.
    9. Lindgren, Petter Y. & Presterud, Ane Ofstad, 2021. "Expanding the Norwegian Armed Forces in the Time of Corona: Benefit-Cost Analysis in the Context of High Unemployment Rate," MPRA Paper 106405, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. William J. Carrington & Bruce Fallick, 2017. "Why Do Earnings Fall with Job Displacement?," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 56(4), pages 688-722, October.
    11. Amy Farmer & Andrew Horowitz, 2015. "Strategic non-marital cohabitation: theory and empirical implications," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 28(1), pages 219-237, January.
    12. Demiralp, Berna, 2011. "Occupational self-selection in a labor market with moral hazard," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 497-519, May.
    13. Jaap H. Abbring, 0000. "Mixed Hitting-Time Models," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 07-057/3, Tinbergen Institute, revised 11 Aug 2009.
    14. Martin Abel & Rulof Burger & Patrizio Piraino, 2017. "The value of reference letters," Working Papers 06/2017, Stellenbosch University, Department of Economics.
    15. Geuna, Aldo & Shibayama, Sotaro, 2015. "Moving Out Of Academic Research: Why Scientists Stop Doing Research?," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis LEI & BRICK - Laboratory of Economics of Innovation "Franco Momigliano", Bureau of Research in Innovation, Complexity and Knowledge, Collegio 201501, University of Turin.
    16. Marcus Eliason, 2012. "Lost jobs, broken marriages," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 25(4), pages 1365-1397, October.
    17. Zuckerman, Ezra W. & Kim, Tai-Young & Ukanwa, Kalinda & James, von Rittmann, 2003. "Robust Identities or Non-Entities? Typecasting in the Feature Film Labor Market," Working papers 4291-02, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management.
    18. Tai Lee, 2022. "The Impact of Employment Protection on the Probability of Job Separation: Evidence from Job Duration Data in South Korea," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 43(3), pages 369-414, December.
    19. Boheim, Rene & Taylor, Mark P., 2002. "The search for success: do the unemployed find stable employment?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 9(6), pages 717-735, December.
    20. repec:eee:labchp:v:3:y:1999:i:pb:p:2373-2437 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Dohmen, Thomas J. & Pfann, Gerard A., 2004. "Worker separations in a nonstationary corporate environment," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 48(3), pages 645-663, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Marriage; Divorce; Job loss; Learning;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J12 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Marriage; Marital Dissolution; Family Structure
    • J63 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Turnover; Vacancies; Layoffs
    • J64 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:labeco:v:38:y:2016:i:c:p:90-105. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/labeco .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.