# Single parent families and race **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 25, 2003, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/single-parent-families-and-race/190925 "2003-07-25T17:27:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2003, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/single-parent-families-and-race/190925/1 "2003-07-25T17:27:39Z")
On another board, one of the guys made the assertion that the majority of all children in ‘black’ families are in single parent homes. To me, this sounded like blatant bullshit, and I told him that off the cuff, without bothering to look for cites. He then posted [this](http://www.ipums.umn.edu/~ruggles/strib94.html). > [@](#): > > For 80 years, from 1880 to 1960, the proportion of black > children living with a single parent held steady around 30 percent, > according to the new research by the University of Minnesota. During the same time, the proportion of white children living with one parent stayed at about 10 percent. For 80 years, from 1880 to 1960, the proportion of black Is this just someone playing with statistics? Is this in fact real? If so, why is it the case that ‘black’ families are predominently single parent (63%?!?)? It seems that ‘white’ families with single parents are also on the rise in the US, but they are no where near the same levels. What is the factor (if this is even real at all) that makes ‘black’ families so disproportionately single parent than ‘white’ families? Is there a similar trend in ‘hispanic’ families? ‘Asian’ families? Is this more a class issue than a race issue (i.e. if you compared peoples of different ‘races’ but at the same economic strata, would the trend in fact be the same, namely would poor ‘white’ families and poor ‘black’ families have similar rates of single partents)? -XT ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2003, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/single-parent-families-and-race/190925/2 "2003-07-25T19:16:38Z")
WAG, but if these statistics are, indeed, even close to correct, perhaps they are linked to the disproportionately high number of black males in American prisons (assuming that these families are American and that the “single parent” translates to “single mother”). ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2003, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/single-parent-families-and-race/190925/3 "2003-07-25T19:33:30Z")
I’ve heard these statistics before. They sound about right. **Cat Fight** , I’d say the statistics are linked indeed. There is a correlation between single parenthood and the likelihood that the kids will someday wind up in jail. Children with absent fathers are at greater risk than those whose fathers are present for teen pregnancy, drug use, poor grades, incarceration, and suicide. Source: [http://www.ncoff.gse.upenn.edu/conference/incarceration-rt.htm](http://www.ncoff.gse.upenn.edu/conference/incarceration-rt.htm) Absent parents produce kids that are at great risk of becoming absent parents themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Reepicheep](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ed655f/32.png) [@Reepicheep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reepicheep)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2003, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/single-parent-families-and-race/190925/4 "2003-07-25T19:35:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Cat Fight \* > \*\*WAG, but if these statistics are, indeed, even close to correct, perhaps they are linked to the disproportionately high number of black males in American prisons (assuming that these families are American and that the “single parent” translates to “single mother”). \*\* That may not be the case. From the DesMoines Register \*The rate of unwed parenting in Iowa has gradually grown in recent years and is especially high among the state’s African-Americans. Nearly three-quarters of the babies born to African-American mothers here are born outside marriage, a statistic that concerns black leaders, educators and social service agencies.\* > **[The Des Moines Register](https://www.desmoinesregister.com/)** > > The Des Moines Register is the number one source for Des Moines and Iowa breaking news, jobs, real estate, photos, videos and blogs. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Moto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de0a6/32.png) [@Mr.Moto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Moto)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2003, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/single-parent-families-and-race/190925/5 "2003-07-25T19:43:47Z")
**Reepicheep** , **Cat Fight** speculated that there was a linkage, not causality. ---
**Author:** ![CrankyAsAnOldMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crankyasanoldman/32/11670_2.png) [@CrankyAsAnOldMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CrankyAsAnOldMan)\ **Post date:** [July 26, 2003, 5:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/single-parent-families-and-race/190925/6 "2003-07-26T05:08:00Z")
On the [fatherhood.org](http://fatherhood.org) website, they talk a lot about such trends. Here are a few staggering ones: “About 40 percent of children in father-absent homes have not seen their father at all during the past year; 26 percent of absent fathers live in a different state than their children; and 50 percent of children living absent their father have never set foot in their father’s home.” I don’t know how that breaks down by race. I’d be surprised if incarceration accounted for a large portion of father-absent homes in African-American children, but then again most of the statistics have shocked the bejesus out of me, so maybe…