At least in Sweden, people who have a long-distance commute are 40 percent more likely to separate or divorce. That’s the finding of Erika Sandow, a Swedish social geographer who studied more than two million partnered commuters for her dissertation work.
Sandow acknowledges that there are career benefits to long commutes — people who are willing to spend 45 minutes or more getting to their jobs get access to a wider range of employment opportunities, and often make more money. But those benefits don’t necessarily hold true for their partners, who may take worse jobs closer to home in order to care for children. And whatever the reason — whether it’s resentment over missed opportunities, or the fact that they never see each other, or what — partnerships where one person has a long commute split up at a much higher rate.
This is probably true whether the long commute is by car or something greener, but car commuters have the added love obstacle of a numb and deadened soul.
