Divorce Down, Marriage Down, Illegitimacy Exploding
This week, the NCHS announced that
divorce rates are the lowest since 1970.
Marriage
is down, and shacking-up is on the rise.[1]
But the federal government forgot to mention the biggie –
the “missing link” -- the one statistic proving that Republican “welfare
reform” is a complete disaster: Illegitimacy is
now at new historic record levels.[2] In 1980, 29.4% of
children were born out of wedlock. In
2004, 35.8% of children were born outside marriage.[3]
While everyone debates why folks are shacking (or hooking)
up in increasing numbers, nobody in the media mentioned what happens when
people live together out of wedlock: Illegitimacy explodes.
In 2004, illegitimate births increased at a record-matching
level of 3%.[4] Illegitimacy
rates are still highest for women in their twenties, but the illegitimacy rate
for women age 35-39 nearly doubled since 1980.[5]
How does all this prove that welfare reform was a
failure? The Personal Responsibility and
Work Act of 1994 (PROWA) accomplished nothing positive. The welfare state was converted into an even
more aggressive “child support state”, actually increasing entitlements to have
children out of wedlock, and granting the Department of Health and Human
Services and state agencies the dual powers of arbitrary levy and confiscatory
powers the Internal Revenue Service never imagined possible.
Illegitimacy is now heavily entitled, and marriage is
not. Married families pay taxes to
support illegitimate mothers (who get tax credits in addition to welfare and
child support).
Why are record numbers of women in their thirties having
children outside marriage? Feminists
have been telling women for years not to marry.
Have a career, nail a guy or two before your biological clock runs out,
and Congress will finance the feminist dream.
Let us put the problem of anti-family federal government
in perspective. HHS is the largest line item in the federal budget – approximately
$612-billion in 2004.[6] It is growing even faster than our defense
budget. In one way or another, the vast
majority of these expenditures go towards undermining or destroying
marriage.
Pop Quiz: What do the
The American public is wise to this, but neither party is
dealing with it. Both parties are
avoiding the issue like Castro avoids Democracy. This is one reason why Congressional approval
ratings in the latest Gallup
polls[8]
place President Bush’s rating 4% higher than the abysmal 29% approval rating
for the “new” Congress.
Political pressure is building in
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David R. Usher is
Senior Policy Analyst for the True Equality Network and President of the
American Coalition for Fathers and Children, Missouri Coalition