Kelleen Kaye

America’s Changing Social Contract

adminn — Mon, 03 Dec 2007 09:00:00 -0500

A New America Event
12/03/2007 - 9:00am

Despite the sustained economic growth of recent years, Americans are increasingly concerned with economic security. Even before economists began reporting signs of recession, skyrocketing health care costs, faltering pensions, and burgeoning inequality frayed the fabric of the American social contract. America's social contract is an evolving, complex web of legal and informal relationships between households, employers, government, and civil society that extends beyond particular federal programs. Now is the time to strike a new bargain between these sectors, rethinking the… more

The Stress of Balancing Work and Family

Communications — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 06:00:00 -0400

A New America Event
09/19/2007 - 12:00pm

Americans know from their own lives the stress of balancing work and family obligations. Extensive rhetoric from the media and academic worlds is difficult to disentangle, sometimes pointing to seemingly different conclusions regarding the state of work and family balance, the time parents are spending with their children, and the impacts such conflicts have on individual and family health.

The New America Foundation’s Next Social Contract Initiative and Workforce and Family Program seek to cut through the rhetoric with… more

The Stress of Balancing Work and Family

Workforce and Family — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 06:12:00 -0400

Executive Summary

American families confront major challenges in balancing work and family life. Workers report that they would prefer fewer hours, while new technological capabilities require parents to bring more job responsibilities home with them. Mothers and fathers encounter strain in work and home environments alike. Polling and surveillance data confirm that the balance between work and family care needs attention. Some of the most quantifiable and severe costs of this burden on families are adverse health outcomes. This paper catalogues a number of factors linked to job stress and work/family conflict: metabolic syndrome, hypertension, heart disease, poor dietary habits, obesity, and mental illness.

These chronic and systemic harms place a heavy burden -- financially, logistically, and psychologically -- on American middle-class families. Families are the fundamental building block of the next social contract; they raise the next generation of Americans. Only through sound policy solutions and broader workplace flexibility can America overcome the challenges that its families face.

For the complete paper, please see the attached PDF below.

The Hour Quotes Kelleen Kaye on Unmarried-Parent Trends

Communications — Tue, 02 Jan 2007 08:55:00 -0500

In Connecticut, where the cost of living is high, single mother-headed households are about seventeen times more likely than two-parent households to live in poverty, and more than half of the state’s singleparent families do, according to the state Department of Social Services... The proportion of single mother households, which vastly outnumber those headed by single fathers, to married couple households has significantly increased over the past 25 years nationwide.Sociologists say the rise in unmarried parenthood is due in part to increasing views among young people that parenthood and marriage are separate undertakings, and that a child can be a path to self-actualization and purpose...[Teenage pregnancy rates have declined, but] age may not have the impact on unmarried pregnancies that [many assume], according to Kelleen Kaye, a family structure analyst and policy expert who is researching behaviors and attitudes toward parenthood for the New America Foundation.It is encouraging that a nationwide push to decrease teenage pregnancy has worked, but the unmarried women who are increasingly waiting until their early twenties to have babies are as ill-equipped for motherhood as teenagers and have less public policy support, Kaye said.More than half… more

Dreams of Motherhood

Cecille Isidro — Fri, 15 Dec 2006 07:26:00 -0500

There are few human endeavors that are as fundamentally personal, yet come with such far-reaching societal implications, as becoming a parent. As cultural barriers break down and technology advances, the circumstances surrounding the conception and raising of children become increasingly diverse, extending beyond the traditional nuclear family structure. This brings both new opportunities and obligations, and changes the demographic fabric of some communities for generations. As intercourse, conception, marriage and parenting become increasingly disconnected, public policy faces the challenge of understanding how the rights of adults, the well-being of children and the interests of society intersect.

While much of the resulting discourse has focused on the welfare culture often associated with single mothers, Dr. Rosanna Hertz reminds us that these are not the only voices of single mothers. In Single by Chance, Mothers by Choice, Hertz offers an exceptionally rich view into the lives of 65 middle-class women who have embarked on a journey into single parenthood. Her study is a useful bookend to Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas’s Promises I Can Keep, a study that follows low-income women into single motherhood. Both studies offer valuable qualitative accounts of the complex and diverse circumstances facing single-mother families. The studies fill the critical gaps in our understanding left by a rich but limited body of quantitative evidence.

The voices in Single by Chance give us a personal understanding of the maternal aspirations held by many single women, and the pitfalls within each of the various routes to parenthood available to them. While much of the literature has focused on the economic disadvantages of single parenthood, we learn that the complexities of helping a child navigate issues of identity are perhaps equally important. We see the level of dedication these single mothers bring in nurturing their children and the deeply traditional goals they have, even as they piece together nontraditional networks to ensure the elements needed to thrive as a family.

Few people would take great exception to a relatively small group of single women who intentionally dedicate themselves to starting a family and raising healthy, happy children, but what do we conclude from their stories in terms of the greater society? It is within Hertz’ own narrative, which she uses to frame these women’s stories and to suggest her own vision for the future direction of families, wherein lies perhaps the greatest potential to move the discourse on family structure forward. I say this not because I share her vision — in fact I found myself disagreeing with her on nearly every page — but rather because she lays a fertile groundwork for asking important questions that we have been reluctant to tackle.

Among the questions that Hertz’ book brings to mind:

Single by Chance describes the identity crisis experienced by children of single mothers as a legacy of our patriarchal society. Hertz applauds the creative efforts of single mothers as they try to adapt their original goal of absolute paternal exclusion to that of partial inclusion for the purposes of building a family narrative. She hints at the policy repercussions that might someday lead to better supports for the mother-child centered family. However, while this complex and carefully constructed narrative is important to consider, isn’t it also possible that her data simply reflect the intrinsic importance of fathers and the possibility that embarking on a path of single parenthood risks consequences to a child’s wellbeing? Is it realistic to feel entitled to an arrangement that expects a father’s involvement but only as strictly delineated by the mother’s needs?
The women depicted in Hertz’ sample are middle class, with financial support from parents, trust funds and other sources. But almost half of all single mothers are mired in poverty. What does this imply for Hertz’ vision of mother-child centered families? Should this be a privilege reserved for women with economic resources? If not, should society then be obligated to support a path into parenthood that is otherwise not economically viable?
While Hertz insists her work does not suggest the complete displacement of men, the fact is, in some communities the traditional father has all but disappeared over the course of several generations. This is especially true of African-Americans, where nearly 70 percent of births are to single mothers. Does one’s view of single motherhood change if, instead of considering a few dedicated women embarking on a new path, we consider far-reaching and longlasting changes to entire communities?

While Hertz’ primary mission was to share these women’s aspirations and explore how they sometimes conflict with society — and with men more specifically — how might the narrative change if the primary focus were on child well-being?

Single by Chance, Mothers by Choice: How Women Are Choosing Parenthood Without Marriage and Creating the New American Family
By Rosanna Hertz
Oxford University Press, 2006
304 pp., $26.00; ISBN: 0195179900

How Research on Family Structure and Children's Development Can Inform Healthy Marriage Practitioners in the Field

Workforce and Family — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 05:00:00 -0500

Is children’s development, and children’s cognitive development in particular, affected by the marital status of their parents? On the face of it, this seems to be a simple question to which there is an intuitively simple answer: yes. Yet the answer to this question is anything but simple. The complexity of this question, the policy context that has helped shape a growing body of related research, and the implications of findings for policy and practice are discussed below. The following discussion is based on my remarks during the plenary session of Connecting Marriage Research to Practice, a conference sponsored by The African American Healthy Marriage Initiative.

While we can readily observe that children in married-parent families tend to be significantly better off than children raised by single or cohabiting parents, it is more difficult to discern how much better off children without married parents would be if their parents were to marry. An extensive body of research on this topic suggests that marriage would confer benefits on these children, even those within disadvantaged families.

The research further suggests that the conduits for these benefits tend to be attributes commonly associated with marriage, such as improved economics and stronger family processes, more so than the marital choice itself. These findings help us understand why marriage matters and provide valuable insights for policy and practice within the Healthy Marriage Initiative.

For the complete issue brief, please see the attached PDF version below.

New Urgency for Early-20s Single Moms

adminn — Tue, 11 Jul 2006 16:41:21 -0400

America made teen pregnancy prevention a national priority, and progress on this front is remarkable. However, increasingly, women are avoiding pregnancy as teens, only to become single mothers in their early 20s. Often their entry into parenthood is just as ill-prepared and perilous to child well-being, yet the policy response is far less adequate.

In 1995, President Clinton pronounced teen pregnancy an epidemic, and, following his call for action, the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy was formed. Congress made teen pregnancy prevention a focus of welfare reform in 1996, and President Bush furthered this commitment with policies emphasizing sexual abstinence and family values.

Prevention efforts now extend to both men and women, and to approaches such as media campaigns, mentoring, youth development, and relationship skills. Although the appropriate mix of abstinence, contraception, and other services remains strongly debated, teen childbearing clearly has fallen dramatically since its reduction became a national priority -- by 33 percent since 1991 -- and all efforts likely played some role.

However, society is trading one set of at-risk parents for another. In 2003, more than 1.4 million children were born to single mothers, a record 36 percent. Roughly 40 percent of those births were to single mothers in their early 20s -- young adults -- and about three-quarters of these young single mothers had only a high school education or less.

Childbearing by singles has grown by over one-quarter since 1990, and young adults account for roughly 60 percent of this increase.

Reducing teen childbearing must remain a national priority, with nearly 415,000 births annually (42 per 1,000 teen women); however, births to young, single adults surpass even "epidemic" levels of teen childbearing, with 550,000 births annually (71 per 1,000 single women ages 20-24).

This new epidemic fails to register as a national priority even though research shows that nearly half the children of single mothers live in poverty (four times the rate for children with married parents), and their rates of substance abuse, male incarceration, and teen pregnancy are two to three times greater.

Unmarried, cohabiting mothers do not fare much better. They are twice as likely to break up within five years compared with married mothers, and their children have more than twice the poverty rate, poorer school and behavioral outcomes, and dramatically higher exposure to abuse than children with married parents.

This probably follows from young women's frequently disconnected entry into parenthood. Low-income single mothers portrayed in Kathryn Edin and Maria Kefalas's groundbreaking book, Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Put Motherhood Before Marriage describe many of their pregnancies as neither intended nor prevented. Motherhood is a natural part of their early 20s, a focal point that will bring love and purpose to their lives.

But because they often see the men fathering their children as unfit or even dangerous, they reserve marriage as a lofty goal for later life. Many enter motherhood with high aspirations for their children and a belief that their love will overcome all serious obstacles, but soon replace such hopes with a quest for basic survival, accepting that their children may follow the same paths into single parenthood, drugs, and incarceration, and redefining success to mean loving their children no matter what.

Public policy largely overlooks single childbearing among young adults, citing a lack of programmatic approaches. However, there are clear steps within our grasp. Declining trends in the accessibility of contraceptive services must be reversed. Recently reported findings from the Alan Guttmacher Institute ("Unintended Pregnancies Rise for Poor Women" and "Unintended Pregnancy Linked to State Funding Cuts") indicate that 33 states made it more difficult or more expensive for poor women to obtain contraceptive services between 1994 and 2001, corresponding to a 30 percent increase in unintended pregnancies among poor women during the same period. Title X, the only public funding going directly to family-planning clinics, has fallen by two-thirds since 1980.

However, our vision of family planning for young adults must extend beyond simply providing contraceptives. It must address underlying changes in behaviors and attitudes toward parenthood. Innovations are needed that reach young adults effectively, focus on the value of stable, two-parent families and the risks to children raised outside of that structure, and impart a greater sense of responsibility. What's needed most is the same sense of national priority and urgency that accompanied efforts to prevent teen pregnancy.

Without greater attention focused on the pathways into parenthood, society's important efforts to help bring parents into healthy marriages, to help parents support their families through work, and to help keep children from falling through the cracks will continue to be undermined.

Kelleen Kaye

Operations — Fri, 16 Jun 2006 14:20:00 -0400

Fellow

Kelleen Kaye is an analyst and policy expert on family structure and family relationships as they relate to child, youth, and parental well-being. She has been a senior policy analyst at the Department of Health and Human Services, where she worked on efforts targeting single parenthood, teen pregnancy, healthy-marriage promotion,… more