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House on mango street

 

According to a recent study [3] of young, non-custodial fathers who are behind on their child-support payments, less than half of these men were living with their own father at age 14.
             Of course, gauging the role of adult men in the lives of children is not as simple as measuring household structure. Many fathers who reside apart from their children remain an important part of their daily or weekly lives. Moreover, in a significant fraction of mother-headed families, there is an adult male (grandfather, uncle, older brother, or a boarder) living in the household who may provide a male role model for children.
             Yet, despite these qualifications, the trend toward declining male presence in the rearing of young children is unmistakable. And for a large number of kids, the absence of involved fathers is not only true of their homes, but also of their neighborhoods. The 1990 Census shows that 2.9 million children resided in a female-headed family within a neighborhood where most of the families were headed by women. This amounts to one out of every twenty kids.
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             Men, Money, and Marriage.
             The absence of a father from a family has many implications, but among the most predictable results is lower family income. Data recently released by the Census Bureau [4] show that the median income for married-couple families in 1993 was $43,005, compared to $17,443 for female-headed families. In 1993 the poverty rate for female-headed families was 36 percent compared to 7 percent for those in married-couple families.
             More than anything else, changes in family structure appear to be linked to changes in the labor force experience of males. Despite cultural shifts in the roles of men and women over the past few decades, being the significant breadwinner remains a key definitional element of fatherhood in America. One recent report on American families concluded, "Being a good provider is still regarded as one of the central roles that men are expected to perform.


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