I do (conditions apply)
Ending a marriage is horrid. Insurance might ease the pain
DIVORCE, like any other risk, can be priced and packaged. With half of all marriages doomed to fail, even the moderately hardheaded may be interested in ways of mitigating the danger.
So hopes ARAG, a German-based insurance firm. From September it will offer a kind of divorce insurance that will pay out if English prenuptial agreements are subject to a legal challenge. Such policies are already common in some continental European countries such as Germany and Spain, and are offered by some American employers as a perk. But they are so far unknown in Britain, chiefly because prenuptial agreements have had little legal force in English law (Scotland's legal system is separate). Judges have traditionally given much greater weight to circumstances at the end of the marriage than to any agreements made at the start.
This article appeared in the Britain section of the print edition under the headline "I do (conditions apply)"
From the August 6th 2011 edition
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