In Whose Home? Multigenerational Families in the United States, 1998-2000

This article examines multigenerational living arrangements of white, black, and Latino individuals using data from the Current Population Surveys. We describe people in multigenerational households as “hosts” or “guests.” In terms of resources, guests have no home of their own, whereas hosts maintain an important source of independence. By age, the proportion of adults living as guests peaks in the late twenties, then declines until the late seventies. In contrast, hosting rates peak in the Žfties. Men have higher guest rates and women have higher host rates at almost all ages. While blacks and Latinos are more likely than whites to live in multigenerational households, those with higher incomes are less likely to live in multigenerational households and if they are living in multigenerational households are less likely to be guests, regardless of race-ethnicity. We interpret this as consistent with the assumption that residential independence is generally preferred. Complex household structures, their determinants and consequences, are important for understanding a wide variety of family-related research questions, including inequality and well-being within and across families, caregiving arrangements, intergenerational transfers of wealth, and the effects of family-related policy. This article looks at multigenerational living arrangements across the life course for white, black, and Latino individuals at the turn of this century. Its contribution is primarily conceptual and descriptive. Descriptive work in this area is important, as Burr and Mutchler (1993:S55) explain: “Understanding the household status of any population is critical because households serve as a platform from which other elements related to individual well-being and the maintenance of life chances are channeled.” Conceptually, standard practices for identifying multigenerational living arrangements and their implications remain elusive. In this article, we develop a method for identifying one type of multigenerational household— * Direct all correspondence to: Philip N. Cohen, Department of Sociology, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697-5100; e-mail: [email protected]. 2 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES Volume 45, Number 1, 2002 parents and adult children living together—and examine how multigenerational living changes over the life course and across racial-ethnic groups. The method we use here is applicable not only to the widely available Current Population Survey but also to other U.S. government data sets and data sets with similar Žle structures. Family structure is related to several aspects of inequality, and causation runs in both directions. Family structure is a purposeful response to hardship (Billingsley 1992), as has been shown in studies of extended households, especially for black and Latino families (Angel and Tienda 1982; Baca Zinn 1982–83; Blank 1998; Hogan, Hao, and Parish 1990). Multigenerational households can pool money, labor, and other resources and extend personal networks and support systems (Raley 1995; Tienda and Angel 1982). Marriage and divorce are also inuenced by economic conditions and the Žnancial situation of each member of the couple (Albrecht et al. 1997; Brines and Joyner 1999). Inequalities in the job market, incarceration rates, health status, and residential segregation differentially affect marriage rates and household structures by limiting options for some groups of women (Geronimus, Bound, and Waidmann 1999; Lichter et al. 1992; Wilson 1987). On the other hand, family structure can also be a cause of income inequality across families because it connotes the number of potential earners and dependents in the family, as well as their gender and age, and these characteristics, in turn, affect economic outcomes (Bryson and Casper 1999). Family structure and inequality issues intersect in the arena of welfare policy. The role of the extended family has received attention in the media and policy arenas as welfare reform takes hold (DeParle 1999; Harris 1999). For black and Latina mothers, relying on extended support networks to raise their children is “a traditional cultural remedy for a very modern structural situation” (Roschelle 1999:325). And, in an era of reduced welfare support, “we can assume that the kin and nonkin support network will become more crucial than ever to the survival of single-parent families” (p. 333). However, the beneŽts of household extension will be conditioned by the economic situation of members of the extended household (Hofferth 1984), as poor families Žnd themselves drawing on the resources of poor network members (Roschelle 1999; Trent and Harlan 1994). Earlier research on multigenerational households focused on the needs of the aged and their ability to coreside with adult children in times of need. Lower fertility and mortality rates in the twentieth century meant a smaller number of adult children on which the aged could rely (Treas 1977). However, by 1990, 90 percent of men and 84 percent of women age sixty-Žve or older were living in their own households, reecting a steep increase from the middle of the century and greatly improved conditions for the elderly (Treas and Torrecilha 1995:69). In the 1980s the great majority of coresidence between parents and adult children took place in the households of the parents (Aquilino 1990). The practice of hosting multigenerational living arrangements has led to dramatic increases in the rates at which grandparents bring grandchildren into their homes, even without the presence of the middle generation of parents (Bryson and Casper 1999; Casper and Bryson 1998). Thus, rather than a shortage of adult children with whom to live, it appears that Multigenerational Families in the United States 3 many in today’s older population may face the opposite problem: too many younger relatives living in their homes. Today’s older Americans are the parents of baby boomers, so their chances of having a living adult child are relatively high (Crimmins and Ingegneri 1990). As the baby boomers reach retirement age they will have fewer adult children—either to lean on or to support—than previous generations did. However, these trends are not independent of race-ethnicity (Mutchler 1992). The trend toward living in the homes of older parents was driven by whites and blacks, as younger Asians and Latinos were much more likely than comparable whites to bring older parents into their homes (Kamo 2000). Treas and Torrecilha (1995:70) report that whites alone account for the increase in independent living in the 1980s. Similarly, Casper and Bryson (1998:Table 2) report that only 19 percent of children living with their grandmothers and without parents are nonHispanic whites.