Marriage and Caste in America

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Marriage and Caste in America

• Separate and Unequal Families in a Post-marital
  Age

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Everyone knows

• 50 of marriages now end in divorce (actually,
  the number is probably closer to 40).
• A third of children in the United States are born
  to unmarried mothers. (According to the CDC the
  number is now 37, growing slowly but steadily.)
• There has been a threefold increase in the number
  of children growing up with a single mother in
  the past 40 years

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What people dont know

• These trends are separate and unequal
• College educated and higher income women are far
  less likely to divorce and to have children
  outside of marriage than less educated and low
  income women.

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The Marriage Gap

• In 2000 10 of mothers with college education
  were living without husbands.
• 36 of mothers without a college degree were
  living without husbands
• The rise in single parent families is
  concentrated among blacks and the less educated.
  It hardly occurred at all among women with a
  college degree. Ellwood and Jencks, The Uneven
  Spread of Single-Parent Families.

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The Marriage Gap and Children

• Social science consensus controlling for race,
  income, mothers education, children growing up
  with a single parent are at greater risk of a
  host of problems including drug and alcohol use,
  early sexual activity, school failure,
  delinquency, and teen pregnancy.
• Less likely to go to college, and more likely to
  become single parents themselves.

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The Marriage Gap and Children

• Thirty six percent of single parent families are
  living in poverty, vs. 6 of married couple
  families.
• Ninety two percent of children in families making
  over 75 thousand are living with two parents.
• Twenty percent of children in families making
  under 15 thousand are living with two parents.

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Why does marriage matter for kids?

• One theory Strength in numbers two incomes, two
  sets of hands, two brains for problem-solving.
• What about children living with cohabiting
  parents?
• Children living with stepparents?

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Marriage not just two people, but a social program

• Not just relationship between two adults
• A social institution that carries with it
  specific cultural ideals and beliefs about how to
  live life.

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The Middle Class Life Script

• Childhood, adolescence including training for
  work whether high school education or medical
  school, self-sufficiency, marriage, and only then
  children.
• The script must be learned. It is not natural.
• Only 8 of those who follow the script
  (graduating high school at least) are poor.
  Seventy nine of those who do not are poor.

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Other (American) marriage messages

• That it is preferable for children to grow up
  with their own mothers and fathers
• That parents try to save money and buy property
  (especially a home) for the sake of the family
• That parents should devote themselves to The
  Mission the childs social, emotional, and
  cognitive development

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Marriage and property

• Marriage in the West always tied up with private
  property
• Net wealth of married couple grows 16 a year on
  average after 15 years, 93 higher than singles
  and divorced. (Jay Zagorsky, Journal of
  Sociology, 2005.)
• Married men earn between 10 and 40 more than
  single men with similar schooling and job
  histories. (Robert Lerman, Urban Institute)

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Unmarriage and poverty

• A number of studies showing increase in single
  parent homes explains much of the rise in child
  poverty rates
• Thomas and Sawhill (Journal of Policy Analysis
  and Management, 2002) say restoring marriage to
  1960 levels would cut child poverty by one third.
  Black family poverty rate would have been 28.4,
  not 45.6.
• Hoynes, Page, and Stevens (NBER, Paper 11681)
  says changes in family structure explain 37 of
  increase, significantly more than the effect of
  stagnating median wages

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Why is there a Marriage Gap?

• Popular explanation more stress and fewer
  opportunities among lower income population
  more fragile relationships.
• Not enough marriageable men.
• Problem - less economic stress among
  disadvantaged married couples than unmarried.

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My explanation for Marriage Gap

• Unmarriage revolution new assumption that
  marriage and childbearing are not connected.
• Disadvantaged women (though not black women)
  marry at similar rates to higher income women
  over their life time but often after they have
  had children and not to their childs or
  childrens - father. (David Fein, MDRC, 2004)
• Vast majority of disadvantaged mothers are
  romantically involved with their babys father at
  birth 46 are living together
• Most see marriage as marker of middle class
  achievement, not means of getting there. Few
  mention children Fragile Families.
• Loss of the middle class life script which offers
  the best chance for moving up the social and
  economic ladder.
• A cultural problem.