America's Children: Resources from Family, Government, and the Economy (The Population of the United States in the 1980s)

America's Children offers a valuable overview of the dramatic transformations in American childhood over the past fifty years, a period of historic shifts that reduced the human and material resources available to our children. Alarmingly, one fifth of all U.S. children now grow up in poverty, many are without health insurance, and about 30 percent never graduate from high school. Despite such conditions, economic, family, and educational programs for children earn low national priority and must depend on inconsistent state and local management. Drawing upon both historical and recent data, including census information from 1940 to 1980, Donald J. Hernandez provides a vivid portrait of children in America and puts forth a forceful case for overhauling our national child welfare policies. Hernandez shows how important revolutions in household composition and income, parental education and employment, childcare, and levels of poverty have affected children's well-being. As working wives and single mothers increasingly replace the traditional homemaker, children spend greater portions of time in educational and daycare facilities outside the home, and those with single mothers stand the greatest chance of being welfare dependent. Wider changes in society have created even greater stress for children in certain groups as they age: out-of-wedlock births are on the rise for white teenagers, half of all Hispanic youths never graduate high school, and violence accounts for nearly 90 per cent of all black teenage deaths. America's Children explores the interaction of many trends in children's lives and the fundamental social, demographic, and economic processes that lie at their core. The book concludes with a thoughtful analysis of the ability of families and government to provide for a new age of children, with emphasis on reducing racial inequities and providing greater public support for families, comparable to the family policies of other developed countries. As the traditional "Ozzie and Harriet" family recedes into collective memory, the importance of creating strong national policies for children is amplified, particularly in the areas of financial assistance, health insurance, education, and daycare. America's Children provides a compelling guide for reassessing the forces that shape our children and the resources available to safeguard their future. "In this conceptually creative, methodologically rigorous, and empirically rich book, Hernandez uses census and survey data to describe several quite profound changes that have characterized the life courses of America's children and their families over the last 50 to 150 years....this erudite book is destined to be a classic." ―Richard M. Lerner, Contemporary Psychology "America's Children goes a long way toward informing the debate on the causes of increasing poverty, and it challenges some widely held misperceptions....its study of resources available to children (and their families) lays a valuable foundation for surveying trends in family structure, education, and income sources....Anyone interested in the changing lives of children should read it; anyone interested in understanding the causes and patterns of poverty, and in designing a better welfare system, must read it." ―Ellen B. Magenheim, Journal of Policy Analysis and Management A Volume in the Russell Sage Foundation Census Series America's Children offers a valuable overview of the dramatic transformations in American childhood over the past fifty years, a period of historic shifts that reduced the human and material resources available to our children. Alarmingly, one fifth of all U.S. children now grow up in poverty, many are without health insurance, and about 30 percent never graduate from high school. Despite such conditions, economic, family, and educational programs for children have earned low national priority and have been dependent on inconsistent state and local management. Drawing upon census and survey data from 1940 to 1990, Donald J. Hernandez provides a vivid portrait of children in America and puts forth a forceful case for overhauling our national child welfare policies. Hernandez shows how important revolutions in household composition and income, parental education and employment, child care, and levels of poverty have affected children's well-being. As working wives and single mothers increasingly replace the traditional homemaker, children spend greater portions of time in educational and daycare facilities outside the home, and those with single mothers stand the greatest chance of being welfare dependent. Wider changes in society have created even greater stress for children in certain groups as they age: out-of-wedlock births are on the rise for white teenagers, half of all Hispanic youths never graduate high school, and violence accounts for nearly 90 percent of all black teenage deaths. America's Children explores the interaction of many trends in children's lives and the fundamental social, demographic, and economic processes that lie at their core. The book concludes with a thoughtful analysis of the ability of families and government to provide for a new age of children, with emphasis on reducing racial inequities and providing greater public support for families, comparable to the family policies of other developed countries. As the traditional "Ozzie and Harriet" family recedes into collective memory, the importance of creating strong national policies for children is amplified, particularly in the areas of financial assistance, health insurance, education, and daycare. America's Children provides a compelling guide for reassessing the forces that shape our children and the resources available to safeguard their future Drawing on census and survey data from 1940 to 1990, this book offers an overview of the dramatic transformations in American childhood over the past 50 years and presents the case for overhauling national child welfare policies. The first chapter examines the life course of children and provides an introduction to the remainder of the book. Chapter 2 notes the revolutionary decline in the number of siblings in families, the corresponding revolution in potential sibling companionship, and the competition for family resources. Chapter 3 shows the increase in the ratio of children experiencing the potential disadvantage of having only one parent. Chapter 4 discusses the displacement of the farm family by the breadwinner-homemaker and dual-earner families. Chapter 5 analyzes the two revolutions in child care arrangements, first for children over 6 and then for younger children, that have taken place as more young children are cared for outside the home. Data are provided on the increasing number of preschoolers without full time parental care. Chapter 6 shows how the first child-care revolution led to a revolution in parent education, as the children of one era became the parents of the next. Chapter 7 focuses on income trends through the 1900s. Chapter 8 shows that most relatively poor children since 1939 have lived in fully self-supporting, working-poor families and notes the impact of welfare usage. Chapter 9 analyzes the impact of changes in fathers' income and mothers' income. Chapter 10 provides an analysis of the ways in which these and other trends are related to one another by exploring some fundamental causes of changes in fathers' income, the rise of mothers' labor-force participation, and the rise of mother-only families. A concluding chapter provides a detailed summary of the changes in resources available to children and on their life course circumstances, with special emphasis on differences by race and ethnic origin. Contains 195 references. (WP) Cover Title page, Copyright, Foreword, Dedication Contents List of Tables List of Figures Chapter 1. Resources for Children: Introduction and Overview Chapter 2. The Family-Size Revolution: From Many to Few Siblings Chapter 3. The Changing Mix of Parents and Grandparents in Childhood Homes Chapter 4. Parents' Work and the Family Economy Twice Transformed Chapter 5. Two Child-Care Revolutions Chapter 6. Parents' Education, Other Family Origins, and the American Dream Chapter 7. Children of Poverty and Luxury Chapter 8. The Working Poor, Welfare Dependence, and Mother-Only Families Chapter 9. Family Income Sources, Family Size, and Childhood Poverty Chapter 10. Fathers' Incomes, Mothers' Incomes, and Mother-Only Families Chapter 11. Resources for Children Past, Present, and Future Bibliography Name Index Subject Index