Living Apart Together as a 'Family Form' Among Persons of Retirement Age: The Appropriate Family Law Response

• Author: Cynthia Grant Bowman
• Position: Dorothea S. Clarke Professor of Feminist Jurisprudence, Cornell Law School. I am indebted to the LATs who were willing to share their experiences and insights with me in interviews.
• Pages: 1-25

1

Living Apart Together as a “Family

Form” Among Persons of Retirement

Age: The Appropriate Family Law

Response

CYNTHIA GRANT BOWMAN*

Introduction

As the Baby Boom generation enters retirement age, patterns of living

among older persons are beginning to change.1 Unlike their predecessors,

the Baby Boomers lived through the sexual revolution, divorced more

easily and more often, and institutionalized new patterns of coupling,

such as cohabitation. As a result, the rate of marriage has declined and

the percent of the population classied as “single” has gone up.2 This

age cohort has now moved into the sixty-ve-plus group and makes up

those we think of as the retirement generation, or the “Third Age” group.3

1. The leading edge of the so-called Baby Boom is comprised of those born between 1946

and 1955. Margaret Hellie Huyck, Romantic Relationships in Later Life, 25 Generations 9, 13

(2001).

2. See Casey e. Copen et al., First marriaGes in the United states: data From

the 2006–2010 national sUrvey oF Family Growth 9 (2012), https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/

products/nhsr.htm.

3. The “Third Age” is a term used for those in or close to retirement. Huyck, supra note 1,

at 13.

* Dorothea S. Clarke Professor of Feminist Jurisprudence, Cornell Law School. I am

indebted to the LATs who were willing to share their experiences and insights with me in

interviews.

Published in Family Law Quarterly, Volume 52, Number 1, Spring 2018. © 2019 American Bar Association. Reproduced with permission. All rights reserved. This information or any portion thereof

may not be copied or disseminated in any form or by any means or stored in an electronic database or retrieval system without the express written consent of the American Bar Association.

2 Family Law Quarterly, Volume 52, Number 1, Spring 2018

As longevity has increased and the divorce rate for this age group risen,4

growing numbers of older persons are unmarried and for longer periods.

Yet they appear to have a continued desire for intimate relationships, along

with an interest in more exible forms of living. One lifestyle that many

sociologists and gerontologists have noted as being particularly suited to

those in this stage of life has been termed “living apart together,” or LAT.5

LAT is a lifestyle in which the partners in a committed couple maintain

separate residences. LATs typically spend several nights a week together,

socialize together, vacation and spend holidays together, and yet each keeps

his or her own home and separate nances. Because this makes it possible

for seniors to combine independence with an intimate connection, LAT

appears to be an attractive lifestyle for this group, as it permits them, among

other things, to keep their own familiar space, preserve their inheritance

for their children, and, in the case of women, protect themselves against

gendered divisions of domestic labor characteristic of marriage.

Relying upon a number of sources, this paper examines LAT among

Third Age adults. First, I explore the burgeoning literature on dating and

partnership among older persons, as well as on sexuality and intimate

relationships throughout this period of life. Second, I discuss research

that has been done about LAT and persons in this age group, primarily by

sociologists in Europe, Australia, and Canada. Third, I describe what my

own empirical research has revealed about LAT among persons aged sixty-

ve and over; my research was based primarily on a series of qualitative

interviews I carried out in 2016 with individuals in that age group who

were currently in LAT couples. In conclusion, I consider what the response

of family law should be to this new lifestyle.

I. New Attention to Sexuality and Intimate Relationships

in Later Life

The attention now being given to relationships in later life is not

surprising, given that the group of persons over age sixty-ve comprises

4. See, e.g., Life Expectancy at Birth, Total (Years), the world Bank, https://data.

worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.LE00.IN?contextual=max&end=2015&locations=US&start

=1960&view=chart (increasing longevity); Renee Stepler, Led by Baby Boomers, Divorce Rates

Climb for America’s 50+ Population, FactTank: News in Numbers, pew res. Ctr. (Mar. 9,

2017), http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/03/09/led-by-baby-boomers-divorce-rates-

climb -for-americas-50-population/.

5. The name LAT, although short for an English phrase, was originated by a Dutch

journalist to describe the way in which he himself was living. Irene Levin & Jan Trost, Living

Apart Together, 2 CommUnity, work & Fam. 280, 281 (1999).

Published in Family Law Quarterly, Volume 52, Number 1, Spring 2018. © 2019 American Bar Association. Reproduced with permission. All rights reserved. This information or any portion thereof

may not be copied or disseminated in any form or by any means or stored in an electronic database or retrieval system without the express written consent of the American Bar Association.