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The Spread of Single-Parent Families in the United States since 1960

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Author Info
Ellwood, David T. (Harvard U)
Jencks, Christopher
Abstract

About half of all American children can expect to live with both of their biological parents at age fifteen, compared to two-thirds of children born in Sweden, Germany, and France, and nine-tenths of those born in Italy. This form of American exceptionalism reflects both higher rates of divorce and higher rates of breakup among cohabiting couples in the US. The increase in divorce, which began in the early 1960s but leveled off in the early 1980s, affected women at all educational levels. The increase in nonmarital childbearing, which was concentrated between the early 1960s and early 1990s, mainly affected non-white women and white women without college degrees. These changes appear to be a product of changes in sexual mores, which reduced the role of sexual attraction and increased the importance of economic calculations in decisions about whether to marry. The increased importance of economic factors coincided with a decline in non-college men’s ability to support a family and perhaps also with an increase in conflict over men and women’s roles.

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Paper provided by Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government in its series Working Paper Series with number rwp04-008.

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Date of creation: Feb 2004
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Handle: RePEc:ecl:harjfk:rwp04-008

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Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:

  1. Leora Friedberg, 1998. "Did Unilateral Divorce Raise Divorce Rates? Evidence from Panel Data," NBER Working Papers 6398, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Francine D. Blau, 1997. "Trends in the Well-Being of American Women, 1970-1995," NBER Working Papers 6206, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. Kane, Thomas J & Staiger, Douglas, 1996. "Teen Motherhood and Abortion Access," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 111(2), pages 467-506, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  4. Hilary Williamson Hoynes, 1996. "Work, Welfare, and Family Structure: What Have We Learned?," NBER Working Papers 5644, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Robert J. Willis, 1999. "A Theory of Out-of-Wedlock Childbearing," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(S6), pages S33-S64, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  6. Claudia Goldin & Lawrence F. Katz, 2000. "The Power of the Pill: Oral Contraceptives and Women's Career and Marriage Decisions," NBER Working Papers 7527, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  7. Weiss, Y., 1993. "The Formation and Dissolution of Families: Why Marry? Who Maries Whom? and what Happens Upon Divorce?," Papers 15-93, Tel Aviv.
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  8. Akerlof, George A & Yellen, Janet L & Katz, Michael L, 1996. "An Analysis of Out-of-Wedlock Childbearing in the United States," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 111(2), pages 277-317, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  9. Cigno, Alessandro & Ermisch, John, 1989. "A microeconomic analysis of the timing of births," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 737-760, April. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  1. James J Heckman, 2007. "The Productivity Argument for Investing in Young Children," Working Papers id:1020, esocialsciences.com. [Downloadable!]
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  2. Kristin Turney, 2008. "Parental Depression and Children’s Developmental Outcomes: The Mediating Influence of Parenting Behavior," Working Papers 1129, Princeton University, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Center for Research on Child Wellbeing.. [Downloadable!]
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