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<title> Why Has there Been a Decrease in the Number of People Who Get Married Young? </title>
In Sweden people get married later in life now than they used to. The change has been a long ongoing process and has many different causes that belong to different time periods. An example of such a thing is that women started to work in connection to the World Wars and the financial independence gave women the ability to choose not to marry, another example is the "hippie" thoughts of free love and opposition towards old conformist ideals which introduced new ways of living, and a third one is secularisation which has removed a lot of the shame of unmarried partnership. These causes have all contributed to a new attitude towards marriage but I will now concentrate on the factors that I think are most important in the present Swedish society.
Today more people than ever have grown up with divorced parents and it is common to marry several times. This is an important reason why the whole concept of marriage has changed. Marriage used to be a lifelong commitment and people stuck together even though it was sometimes more of a practical arrangement than a truly good relationship. Today people have high standards when it comes to marriage and they divorce when they are not satisfied with the ones they have. Since a lot of people do not follow the marriage vowel of lifelong commitment it looses its meaning and this is one reason why I think the high rate of divorces makes people feel that it is not very important to marry. The fact that a lot of marriages end can also have the effect that people no longer believe in lifelong love to the same extent as before and therefore hesitate to marry.
Another cause of delayed marriages is that people get their adult identity and economical independent status later in life. I often meet students who are in their late 20s who talk about marriage and children and are starting to feel time pressure (mostly women I might add). They have often planned to start a family before they turn thirty, but they also want to complete their studies and jet a job before they get married. When you study you have a lot of freedom and life is, except for the studies, mostly about meeting people and having fun. Serious commitments do not fit into the picture. Since it is difficult to get a job more young people study now than ever before. They often continue to study for as long a time as possible for that same reason and therefore marriage and family life is put on hold. A trend in society that goes hand in hand with the trend of later marriage, that also is a product of the employment situation, is that people do not feel like adults even though they are of a what is considered to be an adult age. Employment is one of the first steps towards becoming an adult since it gives you financial independence and responsibilities. Besides unemployment a change in our society contributing to this prolonged youth period is that the youth culture grows and develops constantly through our media society; a culture where entertainment and excitement is in focus. Because of this general change in attitude a lot of people prefer a commitment free life with a lot of possibilities and flexibility to settling down.
Another message conveyed by the media today that is also expressed by friends and parents is that it is better for young people not to marry the first person they fall in love with but have several relationships first. The taboo of being in a relationship and living with someone without being married is gone. Instead it is encouraged that people get a lot of experience before they decide to marry, in order to get to know what they want out of a relationship and really meet the right person. This is the third important reason why I think that young people do not get married as soon as before. They allow themselves to wait and really find the person that they know is right for them. 
To summarise, today young people are faced by the discouraging divorce statistics, they are encouraged not to rush into marriage but wait until the are certain about their choice and at the same time it takes longer time than ever before for a person to become established as an adult in society. The result of this is that marriage is put on hold until later in life. There are as I mentioned in my introduction many other factors that also are important to the development, but these are the issues I think are closest to the youth of today.
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