Ask Doug: Marriage statistics

When two people tie the knot, they ask the state where they live for a marriage certificate to make it legal.

The federal government collects this information and publishes the statistics for all to see. You can find it on the Center for Disease Control’s web site at: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/divorce.htm

The most recent numbers are from 2007, and they show that 2,197,000 people were married that year, while 856,000 people divorced or annulled their marriages.

You can even look at the state-by-state break-down for break-ups. Nevada's divorce rate leads the county, followed by Oklahoma and West Virginia. Florida is near the top tied with Alabama for the 6th highest divorce rate among the states reporting the numbers.

The states with the lowest divorce rate are Massachusetts, Iowa and Washington D.C. The C.D.C. has been keeping these numbers for nearly 20 years, and in Florida, the divorce rate is actually coming down.