Trends in cohabitation and implications for children s family contexts in the United States

TLDR

Stability of marriage-like relationships has fallen while divorce rates stay steady, resulting in more children living in cohabiting families. This study documents the rise of cohabitation in the United States and its implications for children’s family contexts. Births to unmarried women in cohabiting families rose from 29 % to 39 % between 1980‑84 and 1990‑94, accounting for nearly all the increase in unmarried childbearing; consequently, roughly two‑fifths of children experience time in a cohabiting family, and the greater instability of such families heightens the likelihood of family disruption, as life‑table estimates show a shift toward cohabitation and away from marriage.

Abstract

This paper documents increasing cohabitation in the United States, and the implications of this trend for the family lives of children. The stability of marriage-like relationships (including marriage and cohabitation) has decreased despite a constant divorce rate. Children increasingly live in cohabiting families either as a result of being born to cohabiting parents or of their mother s entry into a cohabiting union. The proportion of births to unmarried women born into cohabiting families increased from 29 to 39 per cent in the period 1980-84 to 1990-94, accounting for almost all of the increase in unmarried childbearing. As a consequence, about two-fifths of all children spend some time in a cohabiting family, and the greater instability of families begun by cohabitation means that children are also more likely to experience family disruption. Estimates from multi-state life tables indicate the extent to which the family lives of children are spent increasingly in cohabiting families and decreasingly in married families.