For better or for worse. The dissolution of interethnic marriages in Italy

I study the role of endogamy, or marrying within the same cultural-ethnic group, on marital instability. Using Italian administrative data on the universe of marriages and separations, I show that interethnic marriages exhibit a 15 percent higher risk of separation than homogamous marriages of natives. Moreover, interethnic marriages between native women and immigrant men are 6.4 percentage points more at risk than marriages between native men and immigrant women. Gender differences map onto cultural differences. Intermarriages of immigrants with marked cultural divides are significantly more at risk, and different measures of cultural distance are informative about the incidence of separation.