Love but not necessarily marriage

I don’t know why but I’ve always been fascinated with demographics and the differences among the generations: what were the cultural influences that shaped the ideals of those in their 60s versus those in their 20s and 30s.

Michelle Graff michelle.graff@nationaljeweler.com

This week I had the chance again to wade into my favorite topic working on this story about the number of weddings in 2014.

As I learned in doing the story, researchers anticipate 2.2 million weddings this year, 2 percent more than there were in 2013.

The marriage rate, overall, declined immediately following the recession but now seems to be bouncing back to pre-recession levels, though it’s still not what it was in the late 1970s through the early aughts, when there were as many as 2.5 million marriages a year, U.S. Census Bureau data shows.

Certainly, many marriages during this time frame is attributable to the fact that this is when many of the baby boomers, the large post-World War II generation born between 1946 and 1964, would have been getting married.

But this begs the question, what happened to all of their kids, the generation known as the Millennials or the Echo Boomers? Following many of their parents’ marriages in the 1980s, many members of this generation are now their 20s and even early 30s. What’s keeping them from tying the knot?

Among the easy answers, as I am sure you have read before, are the recession, which caused people to delay marriage because of financial uncertainty, and the increase in co-habitation among young people, which has become more socially acceptable.

It’s almost interesting to note, however, that young people today--not just members of the Millennial Generation but of those above it, Generation X, of which I am a (very young) member--take marriage very seriously.

Last March, the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia published a report called “Knot Yet” examining the benefits and the downsides to what they term “delayed” marriage in the United States. (In the interest of full disclosure, I will mention that this report was sponsored by The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy and also explores the increasing number of children born out of wedlock.)

In the report, they got into the rising average marriage age in the United States, which now stands at about 28 for men and 25 for women, and the whys behind it, noting that, “Marriage has shifted from being the cornerstone to the capstone of adult life. No longer the foundation on which young adults build their prospects for future prosperity and happiness, marriage now comes only after they have

Banner will be right here …

moved toward financial and psychological independence. It’s not hard to understand this mindset, especially given that many of today’s young adults are children of divorce and express worry about divorce themselves; they view marriage as something that should not be undertaken without a suitable exit strategy.”

They also view marriage as more than just: I’ve reached this age therefore I must now select a husband or wife and move on to the next phase of my life.

They want to get married--they don’t view the institution as outdated--but they are looking for that ideal person to marry, a soul mate if you will. If they haven’t found him or her yet, so be it.

As one 37-year-old male friend of mine, who falls squarely into Generation X, put it: “I want to make sure it’s right and not rush into anything and honestly don’t think I’ve even felt close (to finding the right person) ... Why rush into something [because] people think you should be married by a certain age ... And then get divorced or, like most of my friends, just [be unhappy].”

He said “no way” when I asked him if getting married is something he felt like he had to do. “Getting married to get married, that’s not fair to either person or the families.”

A woman 10 years his junior who lives in an entirely different part of the country expressed a similar sentiment. “I think a lot of my friends are making absolutely sure they are with the right person by spending more than a few years together before deciding to get married,” she said.

Retailers, I would be curious for some of your input on this, as I am wondering how much it varies by region.

Are the couples you are seeing today older in general? If so, how does that impact their ring choice? And, are they a different shopper with different expectations and attitudes about the entire ring buying/marriage process as a whole?

Michelle Graffis the editor-in-chief at National Jeweler, directing the publication’s coverage both online and in print.