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Comment by marifi | Hacker News Reader

That's all good and well, but people have been living together after divorce for a long time. This article seems to be nothing but anecdotal data. You almost had no choice but to do this before the '60s. Divorce has always been expensive, and people choose to cohabitate for financial reasons. Perhaps people have been cohabitation after divorce at higher rates since the Fed has raised interest rates, or perhaps not. But it would be nice if this article would show some statistical data over the long run on this. Do we even have any reliable data on rates of cohabitation after divorce?

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Divorce was a totally different animal before no fault divorce became a thing. The idea of an amicable divorce didn't really exist in the public mind. Divorce itself was also scandalous, if you could even get it done.

The rate of cohabitation was probably sky high because most couples who wanted to divorce just stayed married because actual divorce wasn't worth it.

It probably shouldn’t go without stating that many separated women couldn’t establish credit on their own or open bank accounts. Banks weren’t required to lend to women until the 70s. My grandmother had this issue after she divorced.

Women could most certainly establish credit and open bank accounts and own real estate, even as far back as the 1800s. My great grandmother raised three children as a widow in the middle of the Great Depression. Being a widow was quite a bit more common in those days as war killed a lot of young, married men with children. And disease took quite a few others. At any rate, she worked a factory job, and owned her own house. And ran her own checking account.

There were even programs available to women (and men) for obtaining a mortgage, such as the FHA program established in 1934: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FHA_insured_loan (this program is still around)

The point is that discrimination against women was widespread enough that it required a federal law against it in the 70s to rectify. That doesn’t mean discrimination always happened or it was impossible to get a loan or open a bank account.

Just like the 1964 civil rights act. It’s not that discrimination against race or sex or religion always happened, but it happened enough.

Wasn’t the 70s legislation mainly about married women being able to open their own accounts without the consent of their husbands?

I find it hard to believe that there were many banks which refused to open accounts for single women or especially widows?

Wells Fargo, First Interstate Bank, NationsBank, Penn Square Bank, Pacific Capital Bancorp, to name a few.

Source: my divorced single-mom grandmother and her incessant complaints about them.

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