The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 (DRA, S. 1932) includes a scaled-back version of welfare reauthorization. Enactment of the DRA would end the four-year saga of welfare reauthorization legislation. The DRA would extend funding at current levels for basic state grants under the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) blockgrant through Fiscal Year (FY) 2010, […]

This Issue Brief offers policy options for states interested in expanding or initiating efforts to support healthy marriages. It reviews a range of options states have used to strengthen existing marriages, encourage and support new marriages, and educate the public about the benefits of marriage. The brief does not discuss related efforts that states have […]

Between 1989 and 2004, middle-income parents experienced moderate income growth, but only married parents have gained net worth–a significant fact given that the share of households headed by an unmarried parent increased from 26 to 33 percent over the same period. Using data from the Federal Reserve Board’s Surveys of Consumer Finances, income measures alone […]

This paper uses couple-level data from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study (N = 2,363) to investigate factors associated with unmarried parents’ expectations about marriage and the association between their expectations and subsequent union transitions. In most couples, both partners expect to marry, and their shared expectations are the strongest predictor of marriage and […]

Policies governing divorce and parenting, such as child support orders and enforcement, child custody regulations, and marital dissolution requirements, can have a large impact on the welfare of parents and children. Recent research has produced evidence on the responses of divorce rates to unilateral divorce laws and child support enforcement. In this paper the authors […]

In the context of current concern about levels of marital distress, family violence, and divorce, the SFI study is evaluating the effectiveness of an intervention to facilitate the positive involvement of low-income Mexican American and European American fathers with their children, in part by strengthening the men’s relationships with their children’s mothers. The study design […]

A simple model of fatherhood and marriage choice implies that stricter child support enforcement will tend to reduce nonmarital childbearing by raising the costs of fatherhood. We investigate this hypothesis by examining nonmarital childbearing during 1980-1993, a period when child support policy and enforcement underwent enormous changes. We use a sample of women from the […]

In this paper we use qualitative interviews, embedded within a large, nationally representative survey, to examine what new unmarried parents say about their plans and expectations for marriage and to determine why they do not marry. The qualitative data shed light on an apparent contradiction that arises from the quantitative analysis. According to the latter, […]

In Gordon Berlin’s report to Congress he addresses the committee about what is known and not known about the effects of marriage and divorce on families and children and about what policies and programs might work to promote and strengthen healthy marriages, especially among the poor. His goal is to briefly summarize the evidence in […]

What explains the gap between what unmarried parents say about marriage and what they do? One explanation for low marriage rates in this population is the lack of marriageable males – men who are financially stable and non-incarcerated. Another explanation is that a large number of women haveentered the workforce, making them less dependent on […]