Poverty & Parenting

Single-Parent Statistics

As of 2019, 29% of single parents live in poverty.

As of 2019, 6% of married parents live in poverty.

Percent of children by race that live in single-parent families, as of 2019:

• Black (64%)
• American Indian (52%)
• Latino (42%)
• Two or more races (40%)
• White (24%), and
• Asian and Pacific Islander (15%)

Other Single-Parent Facts

Pover­ty lev­els for Black, Amer­i­can Indi­an, and Lati­no chil­dren are con­sis­tent­ly above the nation­al aver­age. But while family structure is just one variable in a much more complicated picture, it certainly merits attention.

Nine percent of new mothers with a bachelor’s degree, regardless of race, were unmarried when they gave birth, according to 2013 data.

Fifteen million children live in mother-only households, according to 2019 data.

Three million six hundred thousand children live in father-only households, according to 2019 data.

Individuals who live in single-parent families as teens receive fewer years of schooling and are less likely to attain a bachelor’s degree than those from two-parent families.

About 1 in 3 American children live in a single-parent family.

In 2020, births to unmarried women totaled 41% - about double the percentage from 40 years ago.

Summary Quote

Sin­gle-par­ent fam­i­lies — and espe­cial­ly moth­er-only house­holds — are more like­ly to live in pover­ty com­pared to mar­ried-par­ent house­holds. Giv­en this, kids of sin­gle par­ents are more like­ly to expe­ri­ence the con­se­quences of grow­ing up poor. Chil­dren in pover­ty are more like­ly to have phys­i­cal, men­tal and behav­ioral health prob­lems, dis­rupt­ed brain devel­op­ment, short­er edu­ca­tion­al tra­jec­to­ries, con­tact with the child wel­fare and jus­tice sys­tems, employ­ment chal­lenges in adult­hood and more." - The Annie E. Casey Foundation, 2022