You always hear that divorce rates are "50%" or something similar, but what does that mean?  Does that mean that 50% of marriages end up in divorces?  Over what time frame?  Are they recent marriages or what?

The New York Times published a story today that sheds some light on this.  Check out the above table.  If you were married in the late 70's, less than half are making it to silver anniversaries.

What's fascinating is how recent marriages are staying together for higher rates for the first five years, but then catastrophically failing within years 6-10.  30% of marriages are done by year 10!  These are statistics, and not predictive, but 1 in 4 women's marriages that survive to year 5 won't last to year 10.

Would love to see these split by other demographic variables: age, education, income, race, etc...