More single moms are working
‘They need the money’ as safety nets such as welfare and tax incentives shrink
As safety nets shrink, women are taking advantage of a strong labor market.
Single mothers in the United States can face many barriers to employment, like finding affordable child care and predictable work schedules. For many, a sick child or a flat tire can mean a lost job.
Yet since 2015, something surprising has happened: The share of young single mothers in the workforce has climbed about 4 percentage points, driven by those without college degrees, according to a New York Times analysis of Current Population Survey data. It’s a striking rise even compared with other groups of women who have increased their labor force participation during this period of very low unemployment.
The last time single mothers’ labor force participation grew so rapidly was during the 1990s, driven by a thriving economy and major federal policy changes, including welfare overhaul and tax incentives. In recent years, though, there has been no new federal policy that would obviously encourage single mothers to work in large numbers.
Instead, they seem to be responding to a patchwork of policies, both carrots and sticks. At the federal level, the safety net has become less reliable, so working for pay is increasingly their only option. But at the local one, new pol- icies like paid leave and minimum wage increases have made it more feasible for single mothers to work. Together, these appear to have primed them to take advan- tage of the biggest driver of all: a highly competitive labor market.
“The calculus of what makes sense changed a little bit,” said Pamela J. Loprest, a senior fellow studying lowincome working families at the Urban Institute. Increased wages and family-friendly policies help “on the edges,” she said. “But as we say, there’s nothing like a strong economy to help everybody out.”
There are 2.7 million mothers ages 25 to 34 who are not married or living with a partner. They make up around a quarter of all mothers in that age group.
In addition to facing the daily challenges of raising and supporting children without the help of another parent, they tend to be poorer and less educated than other women their age. Roughly half make less than $30,000 a year, compared with just 20 percent of all young women. Half have only a high school diploma or less, compared with 29 percent of young women.
For many, jobs don’t pay enough to cover the child care they need to work — so without policies like paid parental leave, sick leave and public preschool, they can’t afford to work.
“We’re talking about mothers, but really we’re talking about the children they’re supporting,” said Matthew McKeever, chairman of the sociology department at Haverford College, who has studied single motherhood. “One of the major factors influenc- ing the well-being of children in Amer- ica is this economic inequality.”
Those without a college degree account for almost all of the recent increase in young single mothers’ labor force participation. Employment has increased for young single mothers of all races, in both urban and rural areas.
Jobs in nursing and in managing and moving inventory in warehouses had the highest growth in employment for young single mothers from 2015 to 2018. Retail and administrative jobs had the largest decline. Though gig economy jobs (like driving for Uber or shopping for Instacart) are not consistently measured in the data, more single mothers are also doing these jobs in recent years, said Danika Dellor, executive director of WANDA, a Bay Area nonprofit that helps low-income
single mothers with economic self-sufficiency.
When unemployment is low, it becomes easier for groups with barriers to employment to find work, and research shows it particularly helps less advantaged families. (Employment has also increased for those with disabilities or criminal records and for the long-term unemployed). Employers might offer higher wages or benefits that could make working and parenting easier, like predictable schedules or remote working.
Single mothers’ entry into work in the 1990s was also driven by a thriving economy and low unemployment, in addition to major policy changes. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, known as welfare reform, required many recipients to work and set an expiration date on benefits. The Clinton administration also expanded the earned-income tax credit for low earners, which becomes more
generous the more people work.
The employment rate of single mothers climbed and the share on public assistance dropped. But work requirements also left a significant number without jobs or federal aid — a group researchers describe as disconnected. They tend to have less education and younger children, and are more likely to be facing physical or mental health issues, substance-abuse problems or domestic violence.
By 2016, there were roughly 3.3 million jobless single mothers and just 1.3 million families receiving welfare, known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, the lowest number since welfare reform was enacted, according to LaDonna Pavetti, vice president for family income support policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Even people eligible for TANF have been applying for it at lower rates, largely because of the reputation that it is difficult to obtain, researchers said. The Trump administration has proposed adding similar work requirements for people receiving food and housing assistance and medical coverage.
“Many safety-net programs have been eviscerated and work requirements have increased,” said Carol Burnett, executive director of the Mississippi Low Income Child
Care Initiative, a nonprofit that supports working mothers. If more single mothers are working, she said, it’s for a simple reason: “They need the money.”