Email us, talk@npr.org. I'm fascinated by this subject. About 32% for a school-age child. Mr. MORAN: You know, that could be the case. You know, I think the system, our laws, our schools, our judges, are prejudiced against single mothers. And it took me until the third one to really realize: No, he's not dead, or maybe he's dead, but they're not divorced. They are younger, less educated and more likely to be living in poverty than are fathers who are raising children without a spouse or partner in the household. The share of single fathers that is Hispanic is close to the share among single mothers (24% and 22%, respectively), but is higher than the share among married fathers (17%). The gap between the two groups is significantly large. Of all single-parent families in the U.S., single mothers make up the majority. And I'll give a for-instance. How do people treat you? I certainly do feel different, you know, a little bit out of the norm at school when I'm dropping him off or, you know, just among parents at play dates and things like that. The culture wars over family structure that raged in the 20th century wars over single parenthood, marriage, and the importance of fathers seemed to have ended in the early 21st century. About Press Copyright Contact us Creators Advertise Developers Press Copyright Contact us Creators Advertise Developers I wouldnt label it with the word positive as in positive aspects of boys growing up without fathers. Across all income levels, single mothers are the group more likely to lack health insurance but the uninsured rates among single mothers have fallen in recent years thanks to Obamacare. No matter the route and circumstances, all single parents share a common ground. Cohabiting single fathers are particularly disadvantaged on most socio-economic indicators. Ms. MARY POLS (Journalist, Time; Author, "Accidentally On Purpose"): Thank you, nice to be here. Thirty-three percent of millennial moms living with their own children are unmarried, according to the Pew Research Center. You can also find endless lists online of inventors and innovators, Olympic athletes, and musicians who were raised by single mothers. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information. The woman was Stanley Ann Dunham, his mother. While about one-fourth (26%) of fathers lacking a high school diploma are single fathers, the share drops to 22% for fathers with a high school degree. We did not ask - we didn't ask that. In the public square, the consensus view about the importance of fathers was best articulated by Barack Obama, in speeches at churches and colleges across the country. From Lynn(ph): I'm lucky in that I'm an older mom, 40 when I had my son. The remaining 41% of single father household heads are living with a partner. ALAN: Well, single fathers run into some of the same things that I've been hearing on the show, that, you know, just the way that you can actually do that by yourself, you know, without a woman around, in your case with a single mom, without a man around and so forth. Beth Akers:To all parents: Dont break the bank to send your kids to their dream school. Readmore. I had to learn quickly not to pay attention to what anyone thought. While this family unit is the ideal, many Church members find themselves in a variety of other circumstances, including in single-parent families. And even though divorce rates have leveled off in recent decades, they remain higher than they were in the 1960s and 1970s. And it seemed to me, as I looked at the survey, the most interesting result was that a great majority of the skeptics were very tolerant of all those other things - interracial marriage, gay couples raising parents, that sort of thing - but they were among those who found problems with single motherhood. That being said, I know that a boy can be raised in a household without a father and there doesnt have to be a negative outcome. I don't know what the answer would have been had we asked about single fathers. the wrong one. Its hard. Partly out of a worthy desire to celebrate the heroism of single parents, progressives too often downplay family structure. One-fourth (25%) of cohabiting fathers lack a high school diploma, compared with 15% of fathers with no spouse or partner in the house. "And her work in many ways foreshadows his. And these mothers can't - they're working three, four jobs, have two, three children and can't provide the financial means to put their children in a position of privilege where they don't get in trouble. This prevalence is due in part to the growing trend of children born outside marriage a societal trend that was virtually unheard of decades ago. One in five millennials is a single dad. ADEL: I find it true in Cub Scouts, as well. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. 11. In the deepest quarantine days, many of us who rely on child care facilities, babysitters, friends, neighborsand activities grew more anxious because we lost our vital agreements outside of our households. But now, progressives are calling into question even the kids-benefit-from-fathers argument Obama made so powerfully and poignantly. Ms. McWilliams brothers, interviewed at her sons soccer game, gladly stepped into the father role for their nephew. Although the Affordable Care Act will give more low-income single mothers access to health insurance, nearly half of these families reside in states that have declined to expand their Medicaid programs. CONAN: Let's see if we can go next to Adel(ph). In 2019, 15 states had wait lists or had frozen their intake for child care assistance, with wait times ranging from 90 days to two years. disadvantage, with the consequences appearing larger for boys than girls. Ms. POLS: Oh, you know, I remember my boss - I was working at a newspaper in California when I was pregnant. She is corn-fed, white-bread, whatever Kenya is not. Ms. POLS: You know, I remember when I was pregnant, one of my dear male friends said to me, you know: You are going to be alone in this emotional landscape. CONAN: Would you explain that - I'm sorry, Mary Pols, go ahead. I met with bankers in glass towers in Jakarta where, nearly two decades before Muhammad Yunus and Grameen Bank shared the Nobel Peace Prize for their work with microcredit, Dunham worked on the largest self-sustaining commercial microfinance program in the world. She was raised solely by her mother Judy Loe for the next four years until Loe remarried. Every elite, out-of-touch, sickeningly rich celebrity was once a tiny helpless baby. hide caption. She taught us to be conscious and compassionate about the struggles of all people. Out of more than 10 million low-income working families with children, 39% were headed by single working mothers or about 4.1 million. Hes a better father than my father ever was.. For more details, see. And I was in Michigan at the time. and Wasserman or anyone else has a definitive explanation for the gender differences in outcomes. Angelina Jolie's parents, Jon Voight and Marcheline Bertrand, separated when the Mr. and Mrs. Smithactress was an infant. You have to be steadfast in your decisions as the leader of your family. They gave me a bag lunch and little help. I mean, obviously, it skews in this very interesting way because the sort of person of first responsibility inevitably is the mother in American society. "He credits her with impressing upon him the importance upon one's duty to others perhaps that the best thing that one can do is to give opportunities for others," Scott tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross. Famous Men You'd Want To Have A Beer With, The 50+ Most Beautiful Influencers Of 2023. Her memoir is titled "Accidentally On Purpose: The True Tale of a Happy Single Mother," and she joins us today from Maine Public Broadcasting Network in Portland, Maine. Click on TALK OF THE NATION. Sean Grover, L.C.S.W., is an author and psychotherapist who leads one of the largest group therapy practices in the United States. CONAN: Those mothers - and I hate to lump them all into a category - but would you say that they were all financially challenged as well? Had she lived, Dunham would have been sixty-six years old on January 20, 2009, when Barack Obama was sworn in as the fortyfourth president of the United States. In 2008, 1.7 million. Catch up on any essays, posts and And - but when I went back six months later, I did. Ms. McWilliams begins the film with her own pregnancy and fearlessly records her parenting struggles with his son from infancy through his teen years. Halle Berry's parents, Judith Ann Hawkins and JeromeJesse Berry, divorced when she was 4 years old. Some of their husbands are in prison. BARACK OBAMA, MARCH 18, 2008. And while 60% of those living without a spouse or partner are 40 years or older, this share is only 30% among cohabiters. Take An Interactive Quiz On Changing Family Structures. We're in Maine now. ", The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mother. At the same time, the role of fathers has evolved, and the public now acknowledges their importance not only as breadwinners, but also as caregivers. No matter how you cut it., Kamala Harris has also said that her mother, divorced and single, was her primary role model. Director Daphne McWilliams bravely explores the health and hardiness of men raised by single mothers. Why Are So Many Young Men Single And Sexless? So during the period when I was doing the research, it wasn't something I was thinking a whole lot about and then was resuscitated by Donald Trump. That first glimpse was surprising the stout, pale-skinned woman in sturdy sandals, standing squarely a halfstep ahead of the lithe, darker-skinned figure to her left. She returned to Honolulu in 1963; she and Obama divorced in 1964. Causation is unclear, but correlation isnt: over all, men and boys are struggling in a changed environment. Sign up to to receive a monthly digest of the Center's latest research on the attitudes and behaviors of Americans in key realms of daily life, 1615 L St. NW, Suite 800Washington, DC 20036USA And 18% of fathers living with no spouse or partner are Hispanic, while fully one-third (33%) of cohabiting fathers are. When it became more and more pressing in recent months, I went back and looked at everything I had ever gathered on that subject. I personally have never let statistics dictate my life, nor my sons future. I drove across the Flint Hills of Kansas to the former oil boomtowns where her parents grew up during the Depression. So you have to ask, compared to what? In an interview for Guardian, Alicia highlighted her mother's strength. And the other thing is a lot of the women I work - or the mothers I see, they're not single mothers by choice. (+1) 202-857-8562 | Fax These details completely transform study outcomes. During a discussion group after the screening, the teenagers shared their disappointment and anger toward their fathers. Recently, Ms. McWilliams and I screened the film for teenagers at Williamsburg Charter High School in Brooklyn. It's our bias against these family structures and not providing the necessary support for them. A record 8% of households with minor children in the United States are headed by a single father, up from just over 1% in 1960, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of Decennial Census and American Community Survey data. This is TALK OF THE NATION. ", "The birther movement began during the campaign, when I was actually writing a series of biographical pieces for The New York Times on then-Senator Obama. The land of opportunity where "the son of a single mom can be president of the greatest nation on Earth," as President Obama put it in his State of the Union speech Tuesday. Study of Mens Falling Income Cites Single Parents, statistical impacts of being raised by a single parent, Parents of the Touch-Screen Generation, Dont Free Your iPad Yet, Well Family: A New Name and New Home for Motherlode, A Family Adds Five Children, Special Needs and All, Stop Asking if My 4-Year-Old Has a Girlfriend, Whether Our Foster Child Stays or Goes, He Is Loved, When Another Child Wants to Be Friends and Yours Does Not. Single motherhood has grown so common in America that today 80 percent of single-parent families are headed by single mothers nearly a third live in poverty. I want to be a better father, a better husband, a better man. No one could doubt that President Obama understood how much fathers mattered for their kids. We can feel left out of social events. Read our research on: Congress | Economy | Black Americans. In other words, poor black boys in neighborhoods with lots of Black fathers were significantly more likely to realize the American Dream. That compassion doesnt come from a place of privilege, but rather one of internal resilience built from challenges. on the sons of single parents, who are usually women. Email us, talk@npr.org. Families headed by single mothers are among the poorest households, more than a third lived in poverty, and as such, are extremely vulnerable to homelessness. She is currently working on a new book about the future of the family in America. Only 8.5% of children in single mother families received TANF. ", On her thoughts about articles written about Obama after he was elected president of the Harvard Law Review, " 'His mother is a white woman from Kansas,' [or] 'His mother is an anthropologist,' or 'His mother is an anthropologist working in international development,' and that would be about it. Obama said yes, and in 1995, his book Dreams from My Father was published. It motivated them to bond with their sons and daughters and heal their own painful childhoods. I'm going to be with him. You know, I have one single-mom friend who says that she feels a little bit as though some people think: Okay, are you here to get my husband? In the beginning, particularly because of speaking to so many people about President Obama's mother's life, and of course that covered his birth, I really had no question as to where he was born. These educational differences likely reflect, in part, the relative youthfulness of cohabiters. In 1970, 31 percent of single-mother families were black, 68 percent were white, and 1 percent were "other race." In 2013, the figures were 30 percent black, 62 percent white, and 8 percent "other." Readers should bear in mind that the terms "unmarried . And at the other end of the age spectrum, fully 47% of single fathers are 40 years or older. It was impossible not to be struck forcefully by the similarities, and the dissimilarities, between them. " [Having no contact with my father] helped show me what a strong woman my mother was, and made me want to be strong like her." Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. Single fathers are also somewhat less educated than single mothers, older and more likely to be white. In 1985, she wrote a list of her long-range goals, which included "finish[ing] her dissertation, making a salary of 60K, los[ing] weight and having constructive dialogue with Barry" a nickname used for the junior Barack Obama. make it easier for single parents to balance caregiving and jobholding. The fraction of low-income Black fathers present in a neighborhood. You know, if a - one of my clients, you know, gets kicked out of school for getting into a school fight and has to go to court, the judge blames the mom, says you're not putting in the family structure in place to keep your child well-behaved, and that kid usually gets adjudicated delinquent, is on probation for 12 months, gets into another fight, and they're stuck in the system. Public opinion ascribes roughly the same hierarchy of roles to mothers. It was truly a blessing to have been in the room with each of them, they spoke and I listened. . They don't give full custody to men. Mr. MORAN: It really was fascinating to us to see that sharp division because you're right, skeptics account for about four in 10 Americans. We're talking with Mary Pols, who's the author of "Accidentally On Purpose: The True Tale Of A Happy Single Mother." Angelina Jolie is certainly near the top of the list. Before I get to the myths and miracles, I was able to speak to Daphne McWilliams about her experience as a parent and the director of IN A PERFECT WORLD. "At the University of California, Berkeley, she met my father, Donald Harris . But he has said he largely thanks his mother for the values that led him to the work he now does. And as you know, studies suggest the children pay the price. And he said to me: So did you consider having an abortion? And comments like that, you know. A few months after receiving the photo, I wrote an article for The New York Times about Dunham. Does a Dog's Head Shape Predict How Smart It Is? One young girl pointed to the school dean seated next to her, a tall imposing man with a firm handshake and determined look, and announced: Mister Sanford is my true father. ADEL: Because a child without a father, you know, it's such an anomaly that it just doesn't even figure, much less for my son - it's a son - my son's experience in community sports. a center-left policy research organization, presents exactly that kind of opportunity. CONAN: This is TALK OF THE NATION from NPR News. About 40% of U.S. single parents were employed in low-wage jobs and often had no access to paid leave. One thing that we don't want to do is attempt to demonize single mothers or necessarily demonize the American public. So we want to hear from single mothers today. SHELLY: Of course. First and foremost, there has been a marked increase in the share of non-marital births. And for the last couple of years, his dad has been out of work. Just over half (56%) of single fathers are white, as are 45% of single mothers and two-thirds (66%) of married fathers. This month, for instance, The Harvard Gazette ran an article entitled, Why living in a two-parent home isnt a cure-all for Black students. Written by Harvard sociologist Christina Cross, it spotlights her research showing that poor Black kids with two parents do not do better on a few educational outcomes compared to their peers with single parents. Binyamin Appelbaum spoke to Professor Autor for The Timess Business Day section (Study of Mens Falling Income Cites Single Parents). Some parents raise kids alone. Well, then who's going to be with this child? CONAN: Bye-bye. And my child was seven months old when his father died, and I have to say I heard your - one of your guests say that it's not an issue about demonizing, but there is - if it's unconscious or subconscious, there is a level of demonization that does go on, and it happens - I watch the single mothers with children that I know. 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