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Reports by Phil Baty from the Royal Economic Society's annual conference at Staffordshire University this week. See research papers.

The higher a woman's salary, the more likely she is to get divorced, Bristol University's economists have found. A paper, I "vont" to be alone: Transitions to Independence, Marriage and Divorce amongst Young Americans, presented at the Royal Economic Society's conference this week, says the opposite is true of men - higher earning males are less likely to get divorced than their lower earning counterparts. The researchers, led by Carol Propper, identified two forces at play: the "good catch" versus the "self reliance" effect, which were perceived differently by men and women.