Marriage and Child Wellbeing Revisited

Revisited Marriage www.futureofchildren.org The Future of Children Marriage and Child Wellbeing Revisited VOLUME 25 NUMBER 2 FALL 2015 3 Marriage and Child Wellbeing Revisited: Introducing the Issue 11 Why Marriage Matters for Child Wellbeing 29 The Evolving Role of Marriage: 1950 –2010 51 Cohabitation and Child Wellbeing Volume 25 Volume 67 Marriage and Family: LGBT Individuals and Same-Sex Couples 89 The Growing Racial and Ethnic Divide in U.S. Marriage Patterns 111 One Nation, Divided: Culture, Civic Institutions, and the Marriage Divide 129 The Family Is Here to Stay — or Not Number 2 155 Lessons Learned from Non-Marriage Experiments Fall 2015 A COLLABORATION OF THE WOODROW WILSON SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS AT A COLLABORATION OF THE WOODROW WILSON SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS AT PRINCETON UNIVERSITY AND THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION PRINCETON UNIVERSITY AND THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION The Future of Children promotes effective policies and programs for children by providing timely, objective information based on the best available research. Senior Editorial Staff Journal Staff Sara McLanahan Kris McDonald Editor-in-Chief Associate Editor Princeton University Princeton University Director, Center for Research on Child Wellbeing, and William S. Tod Jon Wallace Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs Managing Editor Princeton University Janet M. Currie Senior Editor Lisa Markman-Pithers Princeton University Outreach Director Director, Center for Health and Wellbeing; Princeton University Chair, Department of Economics; Associate Director, Education and Henry Putnam Professor of Economics Research Section and Public Affairs Stephanie Cencula Ron Haskins Outreach Coordinator Senior Editor Brookings Institution Brookings Institution Regina Leidy Senior Fellow, Cabot Family Chair, and Communications Coordinator Co-Director, Center on Children and Families Princeton University Cecilia Elena Rouse Tracy Merone Senior Editor Administrator Princeton University Princeton University Dean, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Katzman-Ernst Professor in the Economics of Education, and Professor of Economics and Public Affairs The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily represent the views of the Isabel Sawhill Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton University or the Brookings Institution. Senior Editor Brookings Institution Copyright © 2015 by The Trustees of Princeton University Senior Fellow This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0. Articles may be reproduced with proper attribution: “From The Future of Children, The Future of Children would like to thank the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation in a collaboration of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at the Administration for Children and Families for its generous support. The views expressed in Princeton University and the Brookings Institution.” this issue are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect positions of ACF. To purchase a print copy, download free electronic copies, or sign up for our e-newsletter, ISSN: 1054-8289 go to our website, www.futureofchildren.org. If you would like additional information about ISBN: 978-0-9857863-4-2 the journal, please send questions to [email protected]. VOLUME 25 NUMBER 2 FALL 2015 Marriage and Child Wellbeing Revisited 3 Marriage and Child Wellbeing Revisited: Introducing the Issue by Sara McLanahan and Isabel Sawhill 11 Why Marriage Matters for Child Wellbeing by David C. Ribar 29 The Evolving Role of Marriage: 1950 –2010 by Shelly Lundberg and Robert A. Pollak 51 Cohabitation and Child Wellbeing by Wendy D. Manning 67 Marriage and Family: LGBT Individuals and Same-Sex Couples by Gary J. Gates 89 The Growing Racial and Ethnic Divide in U.S. Marriage Patterns by R. Kelly Raley, Megan M. Sweeney, and Danielle Wondra 111 One Nation, Divided: Culture, Civic Institutions, and the Marriage Divide by W. Bradford Wilcox, Nicholas H. Wolfinger, and Charles E. Stokes 129 The Family Is Here to Stay— or Not by Ron Haskins 155 Lessons Learned from Non -Marriage Experiments by Daniel Schneider www.futureofchildren.org Marriage and Child Wellbeing Revisited: Introducing the Issue Marriage and Child Wellbeing Revisited: Introducing the Issue Sara McLanahan and Isabel Sawhill arriage is on the decline. instability undermines parents’ investments Men and women of the in their children, affecting the children’s youngest generation cognitive and social-emotional development are either marrying in in ways that constrain their life chances.2 their late twenties or not Mmarrying at all. Childbearing has also been Previous Research postponed, but not as much as marriage. With these trends as background, the The result is that a growing proportion of Future of Children first addressed the issue children are born to unmarried parents— of marriage and its effects on children a roughly 40 percent in recent years, and decade ago, in 2005. Then, we found that over 50 percent for children born to women children raised in single-parent families under 30. didn’t fare as well as those raised in two- parent families, that the rise of single Many unmarried parents are cohabiting parenthood was contributing to higher when their child is born. Indeed, almost all rates of poverty, and that children raised of the increase in nonmarital childbearing by same-sex couples fared no better or during the past two decades has occurred worse than those raised by opposite-sex to cohabiting rather than single mothers.1 parents (this last conclusion was tentative, But cohabiting unions are very unstable, given the lack of good research at the leading us to use the term “fragile families” time). The issue went on to consider a to describe them. About half of couples variety of ways that government policy who are cohabiting at their child’s birth will might encourage marriage or enhance the split by the time the child is five. Many of quality of parents’ relationships. Marriage these young parents will go on to form new education programs promoted and funded relationships and to have additional children by the Bush administration received special with new partners. The consequences of attention, although at the time there were this instability for children are not good. no findings from strong evaluations to Research increasingly shows that family tell us what those programs might have www.futureofchildren.org Sara McLanahan is the editor-in-chief of the Future of Children, as well as the director of the Center for Research on Child Wellbeing and the William S. Tod Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton University. Isabel Sawhill is a senior editor of the Future of Children, as well as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. VOL. 25 / NO. 2 / FALL 2015 3 Sara McLanahan and Isabel Sawhill accomplished. We also reviewed financial of cohabiting parents with children, for incentives in tax and benefit programs example, has increased dramatically during and found that they create some penalties the past two decades. How should we for marriage, although the effect of those view these partnerships? Are they just penalties on behavior and the feasibility of marriages without a piece of paper, or are altering them, given the budgetary costs, they something else? We know that such were unclear. After reviewing the evidence, relationships are, on average, less stable or the editors concluded that marriage was durable than marriage, and they seem to important for child wellbeing but that entail less commitment. But cohabitation can policymakers shouldn’t focus on marriage be short- or long-term; it can be a precursor to the exclusion of other strategies aimed at to marriage or to single motherhood; it the same goal, such as alleviating poverty, can involve two biological parents, or reducing unintended pregnancies, and only one parent plus an unrelated male or encouraging fathers’ monetary and emotional female partner; and it can involve a second involvement. parent who is either very engaged or very uninvolved in the child’s life. Repartnering A Decade of Change and serial cohabitation are common, often Although many of the findings and leading to half siblings and creating a shifting conclusions of the earlier issue remain set of members in a child’s household. relevant, the past decade has produced a number of developments and research In addition to an increase in cohabiting findings that made it worthwhile to revisit parent families, we’ve seen much greater marriage and child wellbeing. acceptance of families formed by same- sex partners. The data on married same- Whereas most scholars now agree that sex couples and their children are still not children raised by two biological parents in robust. Since marriage was prohibited among a stable marriage do better than children such couples until very recently, most of in other family forms across a wide range what we know about how children fare in gay of outcomes, there is less consensus about or lesbian households is based on children why. Is it the quality of parenting? Is it the born to heterosexual couples who later split availability of additional resources (time and up. This fact makes it difficult to directly money)? Or is it just that married parents compare children raised in stable, same-sex have different attributes than those who households with children raised in stable aren’t married? Thus a major theme we heterosexual

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