Brazilians postpone marriages, and the duration of unions has also been decreasing, points out IBGE

Brazilians are getting married less and less and getting divorced more and more. Spouses are taking longer to get married and the duration of unions has also been decreasing over the years. Although the covid-19 pandemic has occasionally changed the statistics, this trend was confirmed by the new numbers from the Civil Registry Statistics 2022 survey, released this Wednesday morning, the 27th, by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE).

Since 2015, the total number of marriage registrations has been trending downward. Between 2019 and 2020 there was an even more significant decrease due to the pandemic and the resulting health guidelines for social distancing to contain the spread of the coronavirus. The precautions adopted made holding ceremonies unfeasible, causing many couples to postpone the decision to marry, according to IBGE researchers.

Between 2020 and 2021, the number of weddings increased, indicating that marriage ceremonies were taking place again due to mass vaccination campaigns and the easing of measures to contain Covid-19.

Even so, the number of marriage registrations did not exceed the average for the five years prior to the pandemic (2015 to 2019). From 2021 to 2022, the number of marriages also grew, but still remained below this average (1,076,280). In 2022, 970,041 marriages were registered – of which 11,022 were between people of the same sex.

The ages of spouses in marriages between people of different sexes, regardless of previous marital status, have increased over recent years, for both men and women. In 2000, 6.3% of women who married were 40 years of age or older. In 2022, 24.1% of civil marriage registrations between people of different sexes occurred with women in the same age group.

This phenomenon has also been observed among men. There was an increase of approximately 20 percentage points in the participation of marriage registrations in which men were older (40 years or more), comparing the years 2000 (10.2%) and 2022 (30.4%).

According to IBGE researchers, the increase in the age at marriage may be related to the postponement of the decision for civil marriage and the increase in the number of remarriages. Comparing recent decades, the share of marriage records in which at least one of the spouses was divorced or widowed varied from 12.8% in 2002 to 1.4% in 2012 and, in 2022, reached 30.4% of all records of civil marriages between people of different sexes in the country. In 2022, considering at least one of the spouses divorced or widowed, the average ages of men and women were 45.0 and 40.9 years, respectively.

In 2022, the research found 420,039 divorces granted in the first instance or carried out by extrajudicial deeds, which represents an increase of 8.6% in relation to the total recorded in 2021 (386,813). Consequently, there was also an increase in the general divorce rate: the number of divorces for every 1,000 people aged 20 or over went from 2.5 (2021) to 2.8 (2022).

The average length of marriage has also been falling. In 2010, it was around 16 years. In 2022, the number fell to 13.8 years. In the Large Regions, this average time varied from 15.0 to 17.1 years, in 2010, to 12.7 to 15.3 years, in 2022.

There is a significant increase in the percentage of legal divorces among couples with minor children whose sentence states shared custody of the children. The Divorce Law (Law n.6,515, of 12/26/1977) provides for shared custody of minor children in the event of divorce, however, only with Law n. 13,058, dated 12/22/2014, this modality began to be prioritized even if there is no agreement between the parents regarding custody of the children, as long as both are able to exercise family power. In 2022, the percentage reached 38%.