The Great Recession of 2008 may be giving unhappily married couples pause before they untie the knot of matrimony. In that year, divorce fell from a rate of 17 divorces per 1,000 married women in 2007 to 16.9 per 1,000 married woman, "evidence that the challenges of job losses, foreclosures and depleted retirement accounts may be driving some couples to stick together," according to W. Bradford Wilcox, director of the National Marriage Project of the University of Virginia.

Demographers note that both marriage and divorce rates "tend to fall when the economy heads south and then rise when good times return," and some contend that the decline reflects a dramatic increase in the number of people cohabiting rather than marrying.

One thing remains certain, however: divorce is always hard, and divorce in economic hard times makes it harder still. Ironically, the same pressures that often assault a marriage - money and debt - make dissolving a failed marriage more difficult and, in some cases, a nearly crushing financial burden.

In boom times or now in a recession, divorce is not a magic carpet carrying people away from their debt, but in the Great Recession, which has devastated housing prices, some unhappy couples appear to be thinking twice and taking longer before heading for divorce. A divorce in today’s economy happens on a terrain cratered by plummeting home prices, 25-year high unemployment rates, and staggering consumer debt.

An affordable divorce in the recession not only depends upon both spouses cooperating, but also on both realizing that the recession has called their hand, so to speak, and often cramped their options. One way or another, the two biggest assets divorcing couples divide - the family home and pensions - may well either lost value or been depleted as a result of the economic downturn.