The Struggles of Single-Parent Households

The core of all marriages is the family, family composition, and family values. These values ​​are passed from generation to generation. However, in recent years, the standard North American family has changed. One of the most important changes in family structure over the past two decades is an increase in single parent families. With marriage more and more children are born in adolescence and other social dilemmas, more children are raised and raised in a single parent household. Single mothers are common among ethnic minorities, especially African Americans.

However, if a married working parent has trouble with time management recently, please imagine the struggle of a low-income single parent. Since 1960, the proportion of single parent families (generally female household heads) has more than tripled. Today, 35% of children live in their parents' household. However, while these numbers are increasing, the number of aid that a single mother can obtain is not. Since personal responsibility in 1996 and the Labor Opportunity Act (commonly referred to as welfare reform), in order to return welfare beneficiaries to the labor market, deadlines and job requirements are established and it is possible for a single parent family to gain government welfare benefits It is getting harder. In some states, low-income single-parent families make it difficult to receive other types of assistance, such as imposing job barriers and other barriers to food stamps.

As the number of single parent families increases, it is important to analyze the impact of these families on children. There is no doubt that a single parent household faces a major challenge facing parents and children, but this does not mean that these families are prosperous and can not play a good role in society. Various studies have shown that children of single parent families are worse than those of their parents. The birth rate is low and the death rate is high in a single parent household. Compared with parents' families, the number of children of a single parent family is much smaller in schools even for healthy children aged 15 to 17. The number of children pregnant at these ages is also increasing

Children of only parent families are highly likely to live in poverty. In 2012, the poverty rate of children of a single parent family is three times that of children of their parents' households, 42% of the single parent households are poor, and the proportion of parents is 13%. The Annie E. Casey Foundation explained, "One of the most disturbing trends in child's happiness is that the proportion of children living with two married parents is decreasing." Children of only parents have a high risk of having negative results in later life such as dropping out of school, becoming parents of teenagers, becoming an adult and getting divorced.