The Two-Income Trap - Elizabeth Warren [118]
49 Barnett and Rivers, She Works/He Works, p. 22.
50 Scott J. South, “Time-Dependent Effects of Wives’ Employment on Marital Dissolution,” American Sociological Review 66 (April 2001): 226-245. See also Steven L. Nock, “When Married Spouses Are Equal,” Virginia Journal of Social Policy and the Law 9 (Fall 2001): 48-70. Nock found that marriages between equally dependent spouses (defined as marriages in which each spouse earns at least 40 percent of the total family income) are 57 percent more likely than other marriages to end in divorce.
51 For a discussion of contributors to changing divorce rates among working and nonworking women, see South, “Time-Dependent Effects.”
52 Bureau of the Census, Table CH-5, Children Under 18 Years Living With Mother Only, by Marital Status of Mother: 1960 to Present (June 29, 2001).
53 The number of unmarried, opposite-sex-couple households with children under age fifteen increased from 204,000 in 1977 to 1.7 million in 2000. Bureau of the Census, Table UC-1, Unmarried-Couple Households, by Presence of Children: 1960 to Present (2001). In 2000 there were 27.1 million married couples with children under eighteen. Bureau of the Census, Table F-10, Presence of Children Under 18 Years Old by Type of Family and Median and Mean Income, 1974-2001.
54 Larry Bumpass and Hsien-Hen Lu, “Trends in Cohabitation and Implications for Children’s Family Contexts in the United States,” Population Studies 54 (2000): 29-41.
55 Wendy D. Manning and Pamela J. Smock, “The Relative Stability of Cohabiting and Marital Unions for Children,” unpublished paper (2002). See also Larry L. Bumpass and James A. Sweet, “National Estimates of Cohabitation,” Demography 26 (November 1989): 615-625. Cited in Renata Forste, “Prelude to Marriage or Alternative to Marriage? A Social Demographic Look at Cohabitation in the U.S.,” Symposium on the ALI’s Family Dissolution Principles: Blueprint to Strengthen or to Deconstruct Families? Brigham Young University, February 3, 2001. The authors found that 29 percent of cohabiting unions end within the first two years, compared with only 9 percent of marriages.
56 See, for example, W. Jean Yeung and Sandra L. Hofferth, “Family Adaptations to Income and Job Loss in the U.S.,” Journal of Family and Economic Issues 19 (Fall 1998): 255-283.
57 Among families with children, 38.7 percent gave only one of these three reasons (job loss, medical problems, or a family breakup), 40.4 percent gave two reasons, and 7.8 percent identified all three reasons.
58 Among those in bankruptcy with out-of-pocket medical expenses of more than $1,000, 62.0 percent, or about 243,000 families, had continuous medical insurance coverage. Calculated from Himmelstein et al., “Illness and Injury as a Cause of Bankruptcy.”
59 Calculated from Himmelstein et al., “Illness and Injury as a Cause of Bankruptcy.”
60 Only 43 percent of workers have long-term disability coverage, and only 19 percent have at least six months of short-term coverage. Helen Levy, “Disability Insurance: Where Are the Gaps in Coverage?” unpublished paper (July 2002).
61 In Texas, for example, an individual “must be physically and mentally able to perform full time work” in order to qualify for unemployment benefits. Texas Workforce Commission, “Unemployment Insurance Benefits, Frequently Asked Questions.” Available at http://m06hostp.twc.state.tx.us/CLAIMS/common/help.html#faqs [3/23/03].
62 The proportion of families reporting that the debtor or spouse lost two or more weeks without pay because of illness or injury was 21.3 percent.
63 U.S. Office of Personnel Management, “Long Term Care Insurance Background.” Available at http://www.opm.gov/insure/ltc/ltcbackground.pdf [3/22/03].
64 Statement of Senator Orrin Hatch Before the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, S.1301—The Consumer Bankruptcy