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:
Divorced Families:
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.
==============================
From the research paper:
Divorced Families. Between 1967 and 1984, National Longitudinal Surveys data showed that approximately 44 percent of women fell into poverty after a divorce. Divorcing or separating mothers are 2.83 times more likely to be in poverty than those who remain married. Following a divorce, women are more likely to be impoverished than men. Women whose family income was below the national median and mothers who were not in the workforce before the divorce are very likely to experience poverty following their divorce.
Economically, women suffer more from divorce than men. Though child support helps a woman avoid poverty after divorce, it does not help as much as most think. Over 35 percent of custodial mothers receiving child support were impoverished 16-18 months
following the divorce, while only 10.5 percent of all non-custodial fathers (those paying child support and those not) were impoverished.
Divorce can also increase a household’s dependence on government benefits. Seventeen to 25 percent of wives who divorce after two to eight years of marriage receive AFDC benefits (Aid to Families with Dependent Children, now called TANF, or Temporary
Assistance for Needy Families). Twenty to 40 percent of mothers with minor children receive welfare benefits. Mothers who were employed at the time of a divorce were much less likely to become welfare recipients than mothers who were not working.
Divorced mothers who receive welfare do so for three to four years, on average, during which time they begin to work their way out of poverty. However, it seems that welfare benefits may decrease the incentives for remarriage, a path out of poverty for men and women alike.
Divorced women enjoy different degrees of economic well-being internationally and in the United States because the distribution of public benefits varies around the world. A European study found that “[t]he income women possess on account of their economic activity seems to be relatively little affected by the break-up.” Though women are more likely to enter into poverty due to divorce than men, irrespective of the country in which the divorce takes place, in Social Democratic countries, because women’s welfare benefits usually increase sharply (and, in some cases, double) following divorce, women’s average net income increases by 32 percent.
===========
Marriage reduces childhood poverty by two thirds: study
Patrick B. Craine
WASHINGTON, May 30, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Family Research Council’s Marriage and Religion Research Institute (MARRI) released a synthesis paper Friday showing that economic well-being in the United States is strongly related to marriage.
The paper, entitled Marriage and Economic Well-Being, shows that married couples are better off economically than persons in any other family structure. The paper reports that only 5.8 percent of married families were living in poverty in 2009.
“This research clearly documents why marriage is an important and fundamental part of society,” commented MARRI director Dr. Pat Fagan. “Having the security of marriage in which to foster children is vital to reducing reliance on government welfare programs which cost taxpayers at least $112 billion annually.”
The analysis shows that married men tend to have more stable employment histories and make, on average, almost 30 percent more than their non-married counterparts. Marriage also affects women and children positively. Married women are less lhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifikely to be impoverished, and children from married families have stronger economic mobility as adults.
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.”
“However, the best way to reduce the size of these programs is on the individual level, with committed relationships that are bound together through matrimony,” concluded Fagan.
The full research analysis can be downloaded here.
0 comments:
Post a Comment