Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared on Monster.
The professions with the highest divorce rates cluster heavily in healthcare support, transportation, service, and shift-based labor roles. The lowest rates are concentrated in technical, scientific, and professional occupations, such as actuarial science, software development, medicine, and pharmacy.
While a career choice alone doesn’t determine marital outcomes, occupational conditions such as work schedules, stress levels, income stability, and work-life balance show measurable differences across professions that correlate with divorce rates.
Below, we rank careers with the highest and lowest divorce rates by profession in America, examine common patterns among them, and explore what job seekers can take away from the findings.
Top 10 Professions With the Highest Divorce Rates
The careers with the highest divorce rates range from healthcare and transportation to sales and production roles. Each of the professions below reported a divorce rate above 47% based on rankings from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS) extracted and reported by FlowingData.
These figures reflect divorce rates among currently or previously married individuals within occupational categories, rather than lifetime marital outcomes or individual relationship trajectories, and should be interpreted as broad occupational trends rather than predictive outcomes for any one profession.
- Other Healthcare Practitioners (48.3%)*
- Telemarketers (48.0%)
- Massage Therapists (47.9%)
- Bus Drivers, Transit and Intercity (47.8%)
- Supervisors of Personal Care and Service Workers (47.6%)
- Press Machine Operators (47.6%)
- Correctional Supervisors (47.5%)
- Ambulance Drivers and Attendants (47.3%)
- Orderlies and Psychiatric Aides (47.2%)
- Licensed Practical and Licensed Vocational Nurses (47.2%)
*Other Healthcare Practitioners is a broad occupational category that includes healthcare professionals not classified elsewhere by the U.S. Census Bureau, such as acupuncturists, naturopaths, podiatrists, audiologists, and other specialized practitioners.
Which Careers Have the Lowest Divorce Rate? 10 Marriage-Friendly Professions
Actuaries have the lowest divorce rate by profession at 14.2%, followed by physical scientists, IT scientists, software developers, and physical therapists.
Overall, with divorce rates ranging from 14.2% to 20.7%, these are the 10 careers with the lowest divorce rates:
- Actuaries (14.2%)
- Physical Scientists, All Other (17.2%)
- IT Scientists (18.7%)
- Software Developers (18.9%)
- Physical Therapists (19.0%)
- Physicians (20.1%)
- Clergy (20.2%)
- Pharmacists (20.3%)
- Atmospheric and Space Scientists (20.4%)
- Petroleum, Mining, and Geological Engineers (20.7%)
Highest Divorce Rates by Profession: 22 Career Categories Ranked
Looking at broader industries, divorce rates are highest in healthcare support, transportation, and cleaning and grounds maintenance. By contrast, rates are lowest in computer and math, architecture and engineering, and life and physical science careers.
Across 22 industries, the list below shows how divorce rates vary by broader career field (based on U.S. Census Bureau occupational grouping classifications), not just individual job titles, ranked from highest to lowest.
- Healthcare Support
- Transportation
- Cleaning and Grounds
- Office and Administrative Support
- Production
- Food Preparation
- Installation, Maintenance, and Repair
- Protective Service
- Sales and Related
- Personal Care
- Construction
- Management
- Education and Social Service
- Business and Financial
- Healthcare Practitioners
- Legal Support
- Arts, Media, and Recreation
- Arts and Design
- Education and Library
- Life and Physical Science
- Architecture and Engineering
- Computer and Math
The industry rankings suggest a consistent pattern. Career fields associated with shift work, physically demanding labor, or frequent schedule disruptions tend to report higher divorce rates, while technical, scientific, and professional occupations generally report lower rates.
Why Do Certain Professions Have Higher Divorce Rates? 6 Major Factors
Higher divorce rates in certain professions are commonly associated with long hours, high stress, lower pay, time away from home, and unpredictable schedules.
Though no career choice guarantees (or prevents) divorce, these common workplace factors may contribute to higher rates over time:
- Irregular Schedules & Long Hours: When one partner works nights, weekends, holidays, or rotating shifts, it can be difficult to spend quality time together. Many healthcare, transportation, emergency response, and public safety jobs operate outside the traditional 9-to-5 schedule, which can leave couples with fewer opportunities to connect and maintain shared routines.
- High Levels of Stress & Emotional Burnout: Many jobs with the highest divorce rates involve emotionally demanding or physically risky conditions. Healthcare workers, emergency responders, correctional staff, ambulance drivers, and caregivers may spend their days managing crises, conflict, injuries, dangerous work, or other people’s problems. By the time they get home, they may have little energy left for conversations, family responsibilities, or relationship maintenance.
- Financial Pressure: Financial strain is consistently associated with higher levels of relationship conflict in existing research. Concerns about paying bills, managing debt, affording childcare, or handling unexpected expenses can create ongoing stress that extends far beyond the workplace. Of course, higher income doesn’t guarantee a successful marriage, but financial instability can put heavy strain on a relationship.
- Time Away From Home: Business travel, long commutes, overtime, and extended shifts can reduce the amount of time couples spend together. When partners have limited opportunities to connect, everyday responsibilities and relationship maintenance can become more difficult to manage.
- Workplace Culture & Social Environments: Workplace culture can shape how much time and energy a job takes from someone’s personal life. Some roles involve late-night shifts, frequent customer interaction, difficult managers, networking events, client entertainment, or social settings where alcohol or other substances are part of the environment. For couples, this can create tension around schedules, boundaries, trust, and time spent outside the home. That doesn’t mean social or nightlife-based jobs cause divorce, but when a profession regularly blurs the line between work and social life, it can add another layer of stress for couples to navigate.
- Individual Priorities & Lifestyle Choices: The career someone chooses usually reflects their goals, values, and preferred lifestyle. Some people choose roles because they want stability, predictable hours, and a clear path forward. Others are drawn to fast-paced work, travel, social environments, or jobs where every day looks different. Those preferences can affect relationships in real ways. A demanding career may work well for someone who thrives under pressure, but it can still create challenges if their partner wants more routine, availability, or stability at home.
What Do the Lowest-Divorce Careers Have in Common?
The lowest-divorce careers share several structural characteristics that tend to reduce relationship strain. These roles generally involve higher education requirements, stronger earning potential, predictable schedules, greater job stability, more autonomy, and less stress.
For example, careers such as software development or actuarial work often follow standard business hours and project-based workflows, which reduce the frequency of overnight shifts or last-minute schedule disruptions compared to fields like transportation or healthcare support.
These shared factors may support stronger work-life balance and financial stability:
- Higher education: Many of the lowest-divorce careers require advanced degrees, specialized training, or technical skills that can lead to more stable career paths.
- Stronger earning potential: Higher pay can help reduce financial pressure around housing, debt, childcare, and other major household expenses.
- More predictable schedules: Stable hours and fewer last-minute schedule changes can make it easier to plan family time, shared routines, and responsibilities at home.
- Greater career stability: Clear career paths and strong job security may reduce uncertainty around work, income, and long-term planning.
- More professional autonomy: Having more control over how, when, or where work gets done can make a job feel more manageable and less draining.
- Less exposure to shift work: Fewer overnight shifts, rotating schedules, and emergency call-outs can make it easier to stay aligned with a partner’s schedule.
Should Divorce Rates Influence Your Career Choice?
Divorce rates by profession shouldn’t be used as a primary factor in choosing a career.
These statistics reflect broad occupational trends, not individual compatibility or relationship outcomes. Instead, they’re most useful as a lens for understanding how job structure, such as hours, stress, and mobility, can influence personal life over time.
Consider the factors behind them:
- Work schedule: Will the hours fit the lifestyle you want?
- Stress level: Can you manage the day-to-day demands of the role?
- Income potential: Will the compensation support your financial goals?
- Flexibility: Are remote work or flexible schedules available?
- Travel requirements: How much time will you spend away from home?
- Work-life balance: Will the job leave time for family, friends, and personal interests?
At the end of the day, the best career choice is one that aligns with your skills, interests, and long-term priorities. Divorce-rate rankings can provide an interesting perspective on how work and personal life intersect, but they’re only one small piece of a much larger career decision.
Find the Work-Family Balance You Need
Examining the highest divorce rate by profession may be eye-catching, but the bigger takeaway is that work and personal life are often more connected than we realize. While a job title doesn’t determine the success of a marriage, it can influence the lifestyle that surrounds it.
If your career is consistently creating strain through long hours, unpredictable schedules, or extended time away from home, it may be worth evaluating whether your current role is sustainable long-term or whether a transition to a new role with greater flexibility, stability, or work-life balance could better support your personal life.
That doesn’t necessarily mean a drastic career change. It may instead mean exploring internal transfers, remote or hybrid roles, or adjacent careers that use similar skills but offer more predictable schedules.
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