Although before the 1960s age at first marriage and the proportion of women ever married were similar among whites and blacks, blacks had higher rates of marital dissolution during this period. If we examine the percentage of ever-married white and black women who were currently married and living with their husbands at midlife, the historical story about trends in the racial marriage gap changes somewhat. Figure 2 displays these results. We now see large racial differences in the likelihood of being married even as early as 1930, when only 69 percent of ever-married black women in their early 40s were married and living with a spouse, compared with roughly 88 percent of white women the same age. Some of this difference reflects higher rates of mortality among black men, but some is due to higher rates of separation. In the early 1900s, very small percentages of women, whether black or white, were officially divorced. Somewhat more were married but not living with their spouses, though the percentage was small by today’s standards. Still, the proportion was twice as high for
