If you’re married, the thought of divorce has probably popped into your mind at least once.
Come on, admit it.
And if you’re not married, let me tell you that there’s gonna be a point at 2 a.m. when you have a crying baby and haven’t slept in two months that it’s gonna run through your head to run.
Far.
Away.
But, don’t just take my word for it, take the word of the some 191,280 people living in Mississippi over fifteen years of age who are divorced. Or compare that to the 28,339,199 dAmericans who are already divorced in 2020.
A lot of people make the decision to run away – or simply split up – across the Magnolia State.
Isn’t the divorce rate in America close to 50%? Yes indeed. But that’s not quite what we’re measuring; we are looking at counts and percentages of people over 15 years old who are currently divorced.
You typically calculate that 50% statistic as percent of marriages.
But we are just going to focus on the actual number of divorced people today — what better way to measure marital misery than the straight count of people in Mississippi it affects?
So now that we have you biting your nails, rethinking your world view, and pulling out your hair, let’s take a look at the places in Mississippi with highest rates of divorcees.
Let’s quickly recap before we dive into the methodology and a closer look at the top ten places in MS.
What is the city in Mississippi with the highest divorce rate? That would be Richland, with 15.0% of people over 15 years of age being divorced, per the most recent census data.
What is the overall Mississippi divorce rate? According to the 2014-2018 Community Survey, the overall divorce rate in Mississippi is 8.0%, which compares to the US divorce rate of 10.9%.
Alrighty, on to how we calculated the places with the highest divorce rates in Mississippi.
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How We Determined The Places In Mississippi That Get Un-Hitched The Most
Since that this is the 58th category of rankings we are compiling for the site, we had a pretty good idea where to find data on marriage and divorce in America the U.S. Census Bureau. Because who likes tracking misery more than the U.S. government?
Specifically, we looked at the 2014-2018 American Community Survey specifically table S1201 — Marital Status.
Pretty straight forward on that front — we just had to extract the following column of data:
- Population 15 Years and Over -> Divorced
There’s some kinda interesting/fun/sad data in there like .1% of female Americans aged 15-19 are divorced, but 0% of males (That’s probably a rounding issue, but still).
But the national data is for another day, today the analysis focuses on the 62 places in Mississippi with a population of over 5,000.
We ranked each of these places by the percentage of divorcees over 15 years of age from highest to lowest. We crowned the divorce capital of Mississippi the place with the highest incidence of divorcees, Richland.
And if you’re trying to avoid divorce, check out Diamondhead, the city with the lowest divorce rate in Mississippi.
Now on to a deeper look at the top ten.
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Population: 7,185
Divorce Rate: 15.0%
Divorcees: 862
Median Income: $51,404
More on Richland: Data
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Meridian is the sixth largest city in the state of Mississippi, United States. It is the county seat of Lauderdale County and the principal city of the Meridian, Mississippi Micropolitan Statistical Area. Along major highways, the city is 93mi east of Jackson, Mississippi; 154mi southwest of Birmingham, Alabama; 202mi northeast of New Orleans, Louisiana; and 231mi southeast of Memphis, Tennessee.
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Amory is a city in Monroe County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 7,316 as of the 2010 census.
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Tupelo is the county seat and the largest city of Lee County, Mississippi. The seventh-largest city in the state, it is situated in Northeast Mississippi, between Memphis, Tennessee, and Birmingham, Alabama. It is accessed by Interstate 22. As of the 2010 census, the population was 34,546, with the surrounding counties of Lee, Pontotoc and Itawamba supporting a population of 139,671
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Pearl is a city in Rankin County, Mississippi located on the east side of the Pearl River from the state capital of Jackson. The population was 25,092 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Jackson Metropolitan Statistical Area.
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Greenville is a city in, and the county seat of, Washington County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 34,400 at the 2010 census. It is located in the area of historic cotton plantations and culture known as the Mississippi Delta.
Getting Some Closure In Mississippi After Untying The Know
Besides just coming up with what we thought would be a great new blog/book title, “Untying the Knot In Mississippi: Life After Divorce”, we now have a sense of what places in the Magnolia State don’t pay much attention to the whole “’til death do we part” phrase.
Try to keep in mind that the reason cities rank where they do in Mississippi could be because of the age, education, and income distribution, as all of those things impact the rate of divorce.
And, in all honestly, that’s probably for the best. It’s much better to get out of a toxic relationship than stay it.
Just make sure you have your running shoes ready to go.
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