Married Fathers: America’s Greatest Weapon Against Child Poverty

By Robert Rector

The mainstream media, liberal politicians, activists, and academia bewail child poverty in the U.S. But in these ritual lamentations, one key fact remains hidden: The principal cause of child poverty in the U.S. is the absence of married fathers in the home.

According to the U.S Census, the poverty rate in 2008 for single parents with children was 35.6 percent. The rate for married couples with children was 6.4 percent. Being raised in a married family reduces a child’s probability of living in poverty by about 80 percent.

__________

Here are some of the highlights of this report:

+ Marriage is rapidly declining in American society… creating a two-caste system, with marriage and education as the dividing line…. Single parents now comprise 70 percent of all poor families with children.

+ Children from single-parent homes are:

• More than twice as likely to be arrested for a juvenile crime
• Twice as likely to be treated for emotional and behavioral problems
• Roughly twice as likely to be suspended or expelled from school
• A third more likely to drop out before completing high school.

+ The effects of being raised in a single-parent home continue into adulthood.

• Children from broken and single-parent homes are three times more likely to end up in jail by the time they reach age 30.
• Girls from single-parent homes are more than twice as likely to have a child without being married.
• Children living in single parent homes are 50 percent more likely to experience poverty as adults.

+ Government Complicity

In social service agencies, welfare offices, schools, and popular culture in low-income communities across America, one finds deafening silence on the topic of marriage. The welfare system actively penalizes low-income couples who do marry.

At the beginning of the War on Poverty, a young Daniel Patrick Moynihan, serving in the Administration of President Lyndon Johnson, wrote a seminal report on the negative effects of declining marriage among blacks. The Left exploded, excoriating Moynihan and insisting that the erosion of marriage was either unimportant or benign.

Four decades later, Moynihan’s predictions have been vindicated. The erosion of marriage has spread to whites and Hispanics with devastating results. But the taboo on discussing the link between poverty and the disappearance of husbands remains as firm as it was four decades ago.

+ Marriage: The Antidote to Poverty

To reduce poverty in America, policymakers should enact policies that encourage people to form and maintain healthy marriage and delay childbearing until they are married and economically stable. Marriage is highly beneficial to children, adults, and society. It needs to be encouraged and strengthened, not ignored and undermined.

__________

For the full report, click here.

Robert Rector is Senior Research Fellow in the Domestic Policy Studies Department at The Heritage Foundation.