50 Years of Change for Families:  Education, income, work, and divorce

By Harriet Shaklee, Family Development Specialist
University of Idaho Cooperative Extension

Recent decades have brought many changes to the American family, including new family roles for Mom and Dad, increased divorce rates, and shifts in family economic resources.   Social commentators often raise concerns about these trends, in some cases worried that family life has changed so much that it no longer provides the support children need for successful development.  The list of concerns is long, including questions about what happens to children when Moms go to work, when Dads rather than Moms become primary caretakers of children, when Dads lose contact with their children through divorce, when children are exposed to family conflict, when families live in poverty, etc.

Paul Amato and Alan Booth launched a program of research to inform these questions, beginning in 1980 with a study of families and children, and following up the same families in 1992 when the children were young adults.  Amato and Booth ask what family characteristics in 1980 are associated with which outcomes for the children in those families, as they themselves take on the responsibilities of adulthood.  

Amato and Booth point out that recent decades have brought mixed fortunes in economic well being to American families.  One favorable trend was the higher educational attainment of children born in the 1980’s as compared to those born in the 50’s, with graduation rates increasing at both the high school (from 57% to 83%) and college levels (from 10% to 23%).  Many concerned about the negative trends in modern family life fail to note this important positive development in educational attainment.  The study shows adult offspring of parents with more education are better off economically, have a stronger social network, higher self esteem and life satisfaction, marry at a later age, and are less likely to divorce.   This is an impressive variety of positive effects carried into the next generation from the commitment to education made by families, and made possible by public support for educational programs over this time period.

 Economics and Family Life

The story of family income over these years is less rosy.  The recessions of the 1970’s and 1980’s reversed the post war period of economic expansion, resulting in falling male wages and increases in family poverty and welfare use.  Amato and Booth find negative effects of these trends on adult children of these families, now starting families of their own.   Economic hardship was associated with lower educational attainment for children, greater economic adversity, less help from parents in the transition to adult life, and lower marital quality.     The one bright spot in recent economic trends was to note that smaller family sizes in these decades may have cushioned the effect of lowered family income on children.

The increasing presence of women in the workplace has been fueled by these declining economic trends in family economics.  Two parent families can protect their standard of living by involving both parents in paid employment.   The rise of single parent families through divorce and nonmarital pregnancy, is the second source of increased employment of mothers.    Amato and Booth find a mixed story when looking at the effects of these employment trends.   Mom’s employment is associated with more help from parents as their children reach adulthood, and with a slightly higher occupational status among those adult children.  Effects were most favorable for children of part time working moms, including closer bonds with fathers, and higher economic attainment for sons, but comparable effects were negative for families where moms worked over 40 hours a week.   Amato and Booth conclude that the trend toward maternal employment has many favorable outcomes, but cautions that long working hours for Mom may not benefit children (or Moms, for that matter).

When Moms go to work, family stress can be moderated if Dads take on increased responsibility around the house.  Amato and Booth find that Dads who participate in child care have stronger bonds with their adult children, and that their offspring develop a stronger social network.  Dads who increased participation in housework over the period of the study had children with higher economic attainment.   The authors interpreted these findings to suggest that worries about recent changes in family gender roles are generally unfounded.  Children need a strong sense of emotional and economic security, but which parent takes which role in meeting that need seems to be unimportant.

Divorce

Probably the subject of greatest concern for child well being in recent decades is the increase in the divorce rate.   The rate of divorce in the US increased in the 1960’s, doubled between 1966 and 1976, then leveled off in the 1980’s to a historically high level.  Commentators have worried about the exposure of children to family conflict leading up to and following the divorce, wondered if one parent could build a secure home for family life without a second parent present, raised concerns about the departure of fathers from children’s lives, and warned about the consequences of the lowered income of single parent households. 

Amato and Booth find these concerns to be in order, with marital conflict and divorce associated with negative outcomes for children as they enter their adult years.  Study results show extensive negative effects of parental discord, with associations to problematic relationships between adult children and their parents, more difficulties in dating, lower marital quality and a higher divorce rate, weaker social networks, less education, and poorer psychological well-being.    Parental divorce is also associated with problematic parent-child relationships, increased divorce among offspring, and lower education and income among adult children.  However, effects on children are most negative in families with marital conflict; in these families divorce actually improves life outcomes for children.

    What might this study lead us to conclude about the effect of family trends on the next generation?

 Ø       Recent changes in family gender roles have neutral or favorable effects on children as they reach adulthood.  Whether it’s Mom working out of the home, or Dad doing more work in the home, children seem to be getting the support they need for a successful transition to adulthood.   The one caution is not to work Mom too hard (Moms will say “Right on!” to this).

 Ø       Education has positive effects even in the next generation.  Most impressive is the extension of those benefits beyond the worlds of education and occupation and into the realms of psychological well being and marital happiness.

 Ø       Poverty is hard on children, and provides them a rocky transition to adulthood, with lower educational attainment, less help from parents in moving into adulthood, and lower marital quality.

 Ø       Divorce is not good for children, but family conflict is even worse, with negative effects permeating the lives of the children as they establish homes and families of their own. 

     How can we use this information to ensure a successful transition to adulthood for our children? 

 The first lesson would be the value of an investment in education, with favorable effects for generations to come.  Policy makers should put access to education at the top of their pro-family agenda.  A strong educational program would also go a long way toward reducing family poverty, as long as outreach efforts ensure accessibility to low income families. 

 We also need to limit children’s exposure to family conflict, whether through improving child and family protective practices when the conflict is violent,  building stronger marriages (e.g. encouraging teens to delay marriage and parenthood, providing education in marital skills such as communication, financial management, etc.), or designing better divorces (e.g. strong co-parenting models, sharing family resources with noncustodial children, etc.).   The costs to children are too great to ignore this important problem.   

 Finally, it’s time to quit worrying about changing family gender roles.  There are too many other serious issues to attend to for those serious about family well being.

This article was based on:  A Generation at Risk: Growing up in an Era of Family Upheaval, by Paul R. Amato and Alan Booth, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 1997.