Law Commons^™

Unlike previous work examining marriage and divorce law from an economic perspective, this article critiques traditional economic theory, which frequently fails to address issues like "trust" and “trustworthiness” in the forming of contractual and marital relationships, as well as a number of rules within the modern American marriage and divorce system. Additionally, the article also demonstrates how a number of rules within both marriage and divorce systems can be better understood and evaluated from a behavioral economic perspective and suggests how those legal systems may be developed in the future.

The practical implications of this article are threefold. First, it …