Who says marriage is dead? Not in America.

If your only sense of the state of our unions is drawn from the pop culture and the prestige press, you probably think marriage in America is on the ropes.

The critically acclaimed new movie, “Marriage Story,” described by its costar Adam Driver as a “love story about divorce,” provides viewers with an intimate and raw glimpse into the demise of a marriage in New York City and Hollywood. The bestselling new novel from Taffy Brodesser-Akner, “Fleishman Is in Trouble,” tells a similarly bleak marriage story about another bitter divorce unfolding in New York between a doctor and a talent agent.

Or take the messages about marriage we get from the media. The New York Times recently ran an op-ed, “Beyond Marriage,” from an eminent family scholar suggesting that marriage is “disappearing.” Elsewhere, Brookings Institution fellow Isabel Sawhill warns,

“marriage is in trouble and, however desirable, will be difficult to restore.”

If we look at three key trends over the last decade in the United States, there are bright spots on the family horizon.

1. Divorce is on the rocks

First, divorce is down. In fact, the divorce rate has been falling since it peaked around 1980, at the height of the divorce revolution. According to our analysis, the divorce rate has fallen by nearly 25% over the last decade to the point where there are about 15 divorces per 1,000 married people today — about the same rate as in 1970. And scholars predict that the divorce rate will continue to fall.

Surveys tell us that Americans are less tolerant of divorce today. That’s in large part because, as family scholar Richard Reeves put it, “Modern marriage is not principally about money, sex, or status. It’s about children.” Today’s married couples seem to invest more in staying together, unlike the

Boomers who were obsessed with their own fulfillment in the ‘70s, offering their children a better shot at a more stable family life and future.

2. Children following marriage

Second, non-marital childbearing is down. As Lyman Stone explained at the Institute for Family Studies, though the reasons for the decline are complex, “we are actually approaching a decade of falling births to unmarried women.”

Since 2009, the rate of non-marital childbearing has fallen from 41% to 39.6% in 2018. We think what’s happened, in part, is that young adults in America have become more cautious in the wake of the Great Recession about forming families and, hence, are less likely to leap into parenthood without a ring on their finger.

3. Two-parent households

And, finally, the share of children being raised in intact, married families is ticking upwards. Although family instability and single parenthood are still too high, less divorce and fewer babies born out of wedlock means more stable, married families in America. Since bottoming out in 2014, we’ve seen a small increase in the share of children being raised by their own married parents. Specifically, the share of children being raised in intact, married families bottomed out at 61.8% in 2014 and has now risen to 62.6% in 2019, according to our analysis of Census data. What does all this mean for American children? Children raised by their married parents enjoy a host of life-long benefits compared to children born into other family forms, including more financial stability, greater physical safety, more involved fathers, and greater educational, social and psychological outcomes.