Single Moms Vs Single Dads: Is there a double standard?
In today’s day and age, the definition of a family is not the same for everyone. You may have brothers, sisters, or both — or maybe your dog counts as a sibling. You may have one parent or two — two moms, two dads, or one of each. Or maybe your grandparents or aunt and uncle adopted you. Whatever your family may look like, we can all agree that there is not one way of defining “family.”
With that said, I think we can all agree that raising a family — however that may look like — is not easy. Many logistical factors must be considered among the adults raising their kid(s). How are we going to put food on the table? Who will be working? Who will be watching the kids? How do I ensure the health and happiness of my family? Just thinking about these questions can be daunting for many.
While, of course, this is true for households with two parents/guardians, this is especially hard for single-parent households. So how many single-parent households are there in the US? According to the Pew Research Center, “Almost a quarter of U.S. children under the age of 18 live with one parent and no other adults (23%)” which is about 16,790,000 children. If the average person in the US lives in a home of 3.4 people, then that means about 4,938,235 US adults are single parents (Pew Research Center).
So does being a single parent automatically put you at an economic disadvantage? Using data of US counties from the 2022 Census data, I created linear regression models for family households consisting of married couples, single female parents, and single male parents and where each county ranks on the Gini Index. According to The World Bank, “The Gini index measures the extent to which the distribution of income or consumption among individuals or households within an economy deviates from a perfectly equal distribution. A Gini index of 0 represents perfect equality, while an index of 100 implies perfect inequality.”
Based on the linear regression models above, there are clear differences in the correlations between the family household composition and the Gini Index. The percentage of married-couple families is negatively correlated with the Gini Index (correlation = -0.467; slope = -0.242). In other words, in counties where there is a greater presence of married-couple families, the county tends to be more equally distributed in terms of income. Looking at single-parent households tells a different story. Across US counties, counties with a greater presence of single-mother households tend to exhibit a more unequal income distribution (correlation = 0.366; slope = 0.296). However, there appears to be virtually no correlation between single-father households and the Gini Index given the correlation of about 0.011 (slope = 0.024).
The stark differences in correlations between family household compositions and the Gini Index may be explained by several things. For one, the positive correlation between the percentage of single-mother households may be due to single incomes that can’t compete with dual-income households such as that of married-couple households where we see a positive correlation with the Gini Index. However, this does not explain the difference between single-mother and single-father households in terms of the Gini Index. Following the logic that single-income households can factor into the income distribution within a county should assume that across both single-mothers and single-fathers there is some positive correlation between family household composition and the Gini Index.
Thus, we need to explore other potential factors to further investigate how single-mother households differ from single-father households. With that said, let’s look at the relationship between family household composition and utilization of public assistance/Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). For context, SNAP is a federal program that grants low-income individuals and families nutritional benefits through vouchers or credits to purchase foods at stores (USDA).
Based on these linear regressions above, family households comprised of married couples are negatively correlated with the use of public assistance/SNAP (correlation = -0.569; slope = -0.673). This is unsurprising given that, generally, with two working parents there is more income to support a family, so less help may be needed from outside sources, like the government. On the other hand, in single-parent households, there is a strong positive correlation between family household composition and the use of public assistance/SNAP. Unlike the prior correlations with the Gini Index that revealed stark differences between single-mother and single-father households, both single-parent households had very strong correlations and steep slopes. Single-mother households revealed a correlation of about 0.709 and a slope of about 1.305 and single-father households revealed a correlation of 0.408 and a slope of about 1.989. This suggests that whether one is a single mom or dad, both family households tend to rely on some sort of public assistance/SNAP. However, it is also important to note that the correlation for single-mother households is nearly double that of single-father households. This suggests that there may be an underlying difference between these single-parent households where single-mother households are more related to financial hardship.
Now, let’s look at how race may play a role in the single-parent household composition. It’s no revelation that White people are often at the forefront of privilege, so can race influence the composition of family households? While these linear regressions below, by all means, do not guarantee causation, it is interesting to compare the different relationships. Across all US counties, those with a greater percentage of householders that are only White tend to counties that also have a greater presence of married-couple families (correlation = 0.554; slope = 0.230). On the other hand, the percentage of the householder’s race being only white within a county is negatively correlated to the presence of either a single mom or dad household. While both linear regressions for the single-parent households reveal a negative correlation, the relationship between only white householders and single-mom households possesses a steeper slope and a correlation twice that of single-dad households. Moreover, the slope of single-dad households is virtually zero (slope = -0.032) which indicates that no matter what the percentage of a householder’s race being only White within a county, the presence of single-dad households essentially stays the same. Again, we are seeing the relationship between single-mother households to be stronger than that of single-father households.
With such a common finding across all the linear regressions, it is important to address that this may be due to the fact that, in general, there are more single moms than single dads. Specifically, “in 2023, there were about 15.09 million children living with a single mother in the United States, and about 3.05 million children living with a single father” (Statista). In order to create the “percentage of male householder, no spouse present” statistic, the number of single-father households within a county was divided by the total number of households accounted for within the ACS’s estimate. If there are already low numbers of single fathers in general, the percentage calculated will be low. Thus, there is often a slope of zero for these linear regressions (as seen in the first and third set of linear regressions) because the percent of single dads barely varies by county no matter how the value of the variable on the x-axis changes. With that said, the unequal samples of single moms and single dads within a county poses as a limitation to these findings. Equal sample sizes of single mom and single dad households would help ensure that each household is represented adequately in the analysis by reducing the potential for bias or skewed results due to small sample sizes in one group over another. Although I cannot alter the sample sizes of the single-parent households collected by the ACS, it is important to be aware of this limitation when interpreting these data analyses.
All in all, there is not a clear answer explaining the differences in single-parent households. In terms of the Gini Index, we see a strong, positive relationship for single-mother households, yet with single-father households there is virtually no correlation with the Gini Index. Then, with the use of public assistance/SNAP, both single-mother and single-father households demonstrated strong, positive correlations. However, the correlation between single-mother households and the use of public assistance was twice as strong as that of single-father households. Thirdly, looking at the relationship between householders who are only White and single-parent households, single-mother households revealed a strong, negative correlation whereas single-father households revealed a strong correlation with a zero slope.
Whether we want to admit it or not, ingrained in our society are gender expectations. When you see a single mom on the street, do you ever pity her? Roles reversed, if you saw a single dad on the street, would you praise him for his hard work raising kids on his own? As Dr. Collins points out in Parents about single moms being judged more than single dads, “[it is] because women are supposed to be ‘naturally’ capable caregivers in a way we don’t assume for men.” Going back to the relationship between single-parent households and the use of public assistance/SNAP, even though both single-mother and single-father households revealed a positive correlation, single-mother households’ correlation was twice as strong. It’s possible that single moms often seek public assistance/SNAP because of the pressure they face of being a “good” single mom through society’s eyes, even if they may be putting in the same (if not more) effort as their male counterparts. In the same vein, it’s possible that single dads tend not to seek public assistance/SNAP because they face little to no criticism about their parenting.
Whether or not this is truly the case, we must remain conscious of the way we treat single moms versus single dads. They are both deserving of appreciation, and neither one should be thought of more highly than the other on the basis of gender.
