Single Mothers and Cohabitation

Posted on November 8, 2010 by townsend

• Census finds single mothers and live-in partners, By Tamar Lewin, November 5, 2010, New York Times: “More than a quarter of the unmarried women who gave birth in a recent year were living with a partner, according to a Census Bureau report that for the first time measured the percentage of unmarried mothers who were not living alone. ‘Everybody tends to think of single mothers as being alone with their child, and we wanted to look at whether that was true,’ said Jane Dye, the demographer who wrote the report, ‘Fertility of American Women: 2008.’ ‘We found that 28 percent of these women were living with an unmarried partner, whether opposite sex or same sex.’ While cohabitation has increased enormously over the last generation, the catchall category of ‘single mother’ has often blurred the difference between those living alone and those living with a partner…”
• Facing 72 percent rate of unwed mothers, blacks explore reasons and answers, By Jesse Washington (AP), November 6, 2010, Los Angeles Times: “One recent day at Dr. Natalie Carroll’s OB-GYN practice, located inside a low-income apartment complex tucked between a gas station and a freeway, 12 pregnant black women come for consultations. Some bring their children or their mothers. Only one brings a husband. Things move slowly here. Women sit shoulder-to-shoulder in the narrow waiting room, sometimes for more than an hour. Carroll does not rush her mothers in and out. She wants her babies born as healthy as possible, so Carroll spends time talking to the mothers about how they should care for themselves, what she expects them to do – and why they need to get married. Seventy-two percent of black babies are born to unmarried mothers today, according to government statistics. This number is inseparable from the work of Carroll, an obstetrician who has dedicated her 40-year career to helping black women…”