1) Unconscionable -- IS NOT SUBJECTIVELY DEFINED. At law, it must be objectively apparent that the prenup is "substantially unfair". It's not simply a matter of the judge's conscience -- b/c the determination is a legal one (not a factual one), it must be apparent to the appeals court. BTW, only first-year law students use legal dictionaries, which do not have the force of law in any state, and at best, offer only the shared elements of the meaning of a term as it is individually used in all 50 states.
1b) You see that part where it says "spousal support"? That's crucial -- b/c the REST of the prenup is evaluated at the time of execution, not the time of divorce.
2) Both spouses' quality of living is considered -- the post-divorce quality of living must be equalized -- his may go down, but then so does hers. Usually, even with spousal support, the woman is at a disadvantage. BTW, if you think partying every night is a lowered standard of living for Nas, you don't understand who he is or what he does for a living.
From the source YOU cited:
"Divorce Myth 5: Following divorce, the woman's standard of living plummets by 73 percent while that of the man's improves by 42 percent.
Fact: This dramatic inequity, one of the most widely publicized statistics from the social sciences, was later found to be based on a faulty calculation. A reanalysis of the data determined that the woman's loss was 27 percent while the man's gain was 10 percent. Irrespective of the magnitude of the differences, the gender gap is real and seems not to have narrowed much in recent decades."
http://health.discovery.com/centers/loverelationships/articl...
5) My source was Newseek, based on the latest US Census and the latest edition of the study you cited. If you want to wade through the census data, feel free to do so.
"In 2005, the marriage rate was 7.5 per 1,000 people, while the divorce rate was 3.6 per 1,000, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. But since the people who get married in any given year usually are not the same people who get divorced (OK, maybe a few), the statistic isn't very meaningful. Even if you look at divorces among married couples, the rate has declined from a peak of 22.8 divorces per 1,000 in 1979 to 16.7 divorces in 2005." http://www.newsweek.com/id/161233.
5b) And I reiterate, that harsh divorce laws discourage divorce for both genders. The gender imbalance is not inherent in the laws, it is an outgrowth of the fact that women have babies and usually stay home to take care of them, meaning that they lose/leave their jobs and thus earn lower pay for their relative age/experience.
BTW, have you ever looked at European family law? Divorce is even easier than getting married, and it shows -- European divorce rates trump the US.
I worked in the Family Court for a year. I can say from experience (a) people do not think about divorce when they think about getting married, unless they are wealthy and/or educated (b) young people do not generally put much thought, if any, to marriage beyond what their hormones are telling them, (c) people have plenty of kids before/outside of marriage just fine as it is, and finally (d) stress from child-rearing is a significant factor in most divorces -- couples with more children are more likely to get divorced. Don't believe me? Have you ever heard of "Jon and Kate + 8"? For a few weeks, you couldn't read a newspaper without seeing talking heads talk about the divorce rate among parents of large broods (4+ children).