In-depth study: After divorce, 44% of women fell into poverty

MARRIAGE AND ECONOMIC WELL-BEING: THE ECONOMY OF THE FAMILY RISES OR FALLS WITH MARRIAGE
Research May 2011 of Family Research Council (found here)

Fagan pointed to the massive cost of divorce on society, noting, “If the government pledged to reduce family breakdown by just one percent, taxpayers would save around $1.1 billion dollars each year.”

Executive summary of research paper:
The income decline that follows divorce, particularly among women, is well documented. Divorcing or separating mothers are 2.83 times more likely to be in poverty than those who remain married.

Following a divorce, the parent with custody of the children experiences a 52 percent drop in his or her family income.

The children of divorced mothers are less likely to earn incomes in the top third of the income distribution, regardless of where in the income distribution their parents’ income fell.

The full research analysis can be downloaded here.

More data can be found here and here, detailing the figure of 44% of women falling into poverty.
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One of the best studies on the over-all effects of divorce is The Effects of Divorce on Children, by Fagan and Churchill, January 2012. It cites numerous studies.

This can be found here in this website: marri.us

You can download the study here:
  (Download PDF) (.pdf): Free
  (Download PDF-Executive Summary) (.pdf): Free

Executive Summary:
Each year, over a million American children suffer the divorce of their parents. Divorce causes irreparable harm to all involved, but most especially to children.
Divorce detrimentally impacts individuals and society in numerous ways across all major institutions.

• Family: Divorce permanently weakens the family and the relationship between children and parents. It frequently leads to the development of destructive conflict management methods, diminished social competence, the early loss of virginity, diminished sense of masculinity or femininity, more trouble with dating, more cohabitation, greater likelihood of divorce, higher expectations of divorce later in life, and a decreased desire to have children.
• Religious practice: Divorce diminishes the frequency of worship of God and recourse to Him in prayer.
• Education: Divorce diminishes children's learning capacity and educational attainment.
• The marketplace: Divorce reduces household income and deeply cuts individual earning capacity.
• Government: Divorce significantly increases crime, abuse and neglect, drug use, and the costs of compensating government services.
• Health and well-being: Divorce weakens children's health and longevity. It also increases behavioral, emotional, and psychiatric risks, including even suicide.

Divorce damages society and consumes social, human, and economic capital. Though it might be shown to benefit some individuals in some individual cases, overall it causes a temporary decrease in an individual's quality of life and puts some "on a downward trajectory from which they might never fully recover."