40 percent of U.S. marriages are remarriages

WASHINGTON, Nov. 14 (UPI) -- In 40 percent of U.S. marriages at least one partner has been divorced or widowed, a Pew Research Report released Friday said.

For one out of every five newly married couples, both have previously tied the knot.

Pew analyzed U.S. Census data and found that 42 million adults have been married at least twice, up from 22 million in 1980 and 14 million in 1960. The number of remarriages has grown at a time when fewer people are marrying even once with 23 percent of adults in the country now on at least a second marriage.

The report said that 57 percent of the divorced and widowed remarry, a percentage that has remained about the same for decades. But the percentage of adults who have married at all has dropped form 85 percent in 1960 to 70 percent today.

Analysts said the aging of the population and continued rise in divorce appear to be fueling the trend.

"We're not seeing an outbreak in remarriage fever. We're seeing an increase in the number of people who are in a position to remarry," Andrew J. Cherlin, a sociology professor at Johns Hopkins University, told the Washington Post. "What's happened is that the share of the population that's divorced has risen greatly. In particular, the baby boomer generation -- which experienced more divorce than any generation in history-- is now in their 50s and 60s. They've lived long enough, and there are now more of them to get remarried."

Surveys show that men are more open to the idea of remarriage, with only 30 percent of those who have been divorced or widowed saying they do not want to do it again. Among women, 54 percent do not want to marry again.

Cherlin said that older, formerly married men expect their new wives to take care of them while older women are less open to taking on that responsibility.

Remarriage is more common among older adults, with 50 percent of the divorced or widowed having remarried in 2013, up from 34 percent in 1960. But only 43 percent of those between the ages of 25 and 34 had remarried in 2013, down from 75 percent in 1960.