Welfare reform and child poverty: effects of maternal employment, marriage, and cohabitation ¬リニ

The welfare reform debate centers on whether the best strategy to reduce poverty is to raise work participation among low-income women or to promote marriage. Using the 1992–2001 demographic supplements of the Current Population Survey, we track child poverty rates before and after passage of the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act. We find that increasing maternal employment accounted for roughly one-half of the decline in poverty among children living with single mothers. The largest economic benefits from increasing maternal employment were observed among African American children and those living with poorly educated mothers. Unlike the 1991–1995 period, changes in family structure over 1996–2000 were no longer giving demographic impetus to higher child poverty rates. Evidence that recent declines in nonmarital fertility have reduced child poverty rates, however, is limited. We conclude with benchmark estimates of the economic implications of marriage promotion initiatives and document post-1996 increases in children s co-residence in cohabiting couple families. 2003 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. The authors acknowledge the support of a grant from Save the Children Federation, the helpful comments of Marcia Carlson and the anonymous reviewers, and the computing assistance of Merlin Marshall. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2001 annual meetings of the Population Association of America, Atlanta. * Corresponding author. Fax: +1-614-688-3571. E-mail address: [email protected] (D.T. Lichter). 0049-089X/$ see front matter 2003 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.ssresearch.2003.09.001 Social Science Research 33 (2004) 385–408 www.elsevier.com/locate/ssresearch Social Science RESEARCH