NO-FAULT LAWS AND AT-FAULT PEOPLE

Absent transaction costs, the Cease Theorem suggests that divorce refo rm would work no change in the frequency of divorce but perhaps would alter the distribution of marital wealth. However, divorce does involv e substantial process costs, which no-fault lowered. This paper explor es the question of what happened to state divorce rates because of the legal changes wrought by the family law revolution that began in the 1970s, isolating the effect of, the legal variable from other demograp hic and social factors that might also explain the variation in divorc e rates across states and across time. (C) 1998 by Elsevier Science In c.