Out of Wedlock Birth Rates Steady

Item from the Smart Marriages Archive, reproduced in the Divorce Statistics Collectio n

Out-of-wedlock birthrates steady

Congress' contest spurs Michigan, few others

October 11, 1999 -- Detroit Free Press

BY MARIE McCULLOUGH KNIGHT RIDDER NEWSPAPERS

Three years ago, Congress created a contest intended to motivate every
state to fight out-of-wedlock births.

The prize was $100 million, to be shared by the five states that reduced
their out-of-wedlock birthrates the most without increasing abortions.

Michigan was one of the five winners.

This experiment in social engineering was part of the Welfare Reform Act
of 1996, a law that aimed to put more poor people to work and restore
traditional family values.

All 50 states competed, but their out-of-wedlock birthrates -- announced
last month by federal officials -- suggest that the problem of unwed
motherhood has become deeply rooted in U.S. society.

Overall, the out-of-wedlock birthrate did not budge between 1994-95 and
1995-96. About one in three babies -- 32.4 percent -- was born to an
unwed mother.

Twelve states showed minuscule reductions. The winners were Michigan,
Alabama, California, the District of Columbia and Massachusetts. Each got
$20 million.

The District of Columbia remained a glaring example of socially
disastrous marriage and birth patterns, with two of every three babies
born to unwed women there, the nation's worst rate.

"The unfortunate truth is, it's very hard to budge a lot of these rates,
such as teen pregnancy and out-of-wedlock births," said Sarah Brown,
director of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy.

"There are many forces at work ...and it would be naive to expect to see
a dramatic impact."

Despite the numbers, welfare officials and social-policy experts are not
discouraged. This was the first round of a contest that is to run
annually through 2002.

Though most states launched programs to reduce teen pregnancy long before
the contest was announced, the intensity and variety of programs are
still growing. Experts hope that teen birth and abortion rates, which
have fallen nationwide for years, are harbingers of the unwed birthrate
trend.

"It's fair to say the first effort is not going to give a complete
picture of the effectiveness of this provision," said Michael Kharfen,
spokesman for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

The leveling off of the out-of-wedlock birthrate is heartening, experts
say. The unwed-birth and divorce rates have soared in the last 30 years
throughout the Western world as a result of cultural and economic
changes. In the United States, the unwed-birthrate climbed from 11
percent in 1970 to 32 percent in the mid-1990s.

It remains to be seen whether offering more money through the contest is
an effective incentive.

Nor is it clear whether some programs are more effective than others in
reducing out-of-wedlock births. Liberals have traditionally stressed sex
education and access to contraception; conservatives have stressed
preaching sexual abstinence until marriage.

States have used various approaches.

"You can't pinpoint any one thing that led to the decline," said Geralyn
Lasher, speaking for the Department of Community Health in Michigan,
which cut its rate by 3.7 percent. "It was a combination of activities."

| Smart Marriages Archive | New Divorce Statistics and Studies Blog | Older Divorce Statistics Collection Archive |