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Divorce/Separation in Later-Life: A Fixed Effects Analysis of Economic Well-Being by Gender

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Abstract

With the on-going aging of the United States’ population and an increase in the number of older men and women living in a divorced/separated state, examining the economic security of this group is a worthwhile undertaking. Utilizing the 2004 and 2010 waves of the RAND Health and Retirement Study, this study employed fixed effects (FE) regression to examine the effects of divorce/separation on total wealth for older men and women. Results suggested older divorced/separated individuals endured a significant loss in total wealth due to a martial disruption and women fared worse than men. However, older adults can take proactive steps to ease this financial setback.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank four anonymous reviewers for helpful suggestions. I would like to recognize Edward Norton and Shu-Wen Ng for assistance with the fixed effects interaction and the College of Human Sciences at Texas Tech University, where an earlier version of this paper was presented.

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  1. Policy Studies, University of Denver, Denver, CO, 80208, USA

    Andy Sharma

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Sharma, A. Divorce/Separation in Later-Life: A Fixed Effects Analysis of Economic Well-Being by Gender. J Fam Econ Iss 36, 299–306 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10834-014-9432-1

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