Children in Single-Parent Families: Explaining Variation in Nonmetro Areas in the Pacific Northwest

Abstract

Abstract The increasing percent of children in single-parent families has long been an issue of concern. However, there is often a perception that this is more of an urban than a rural problem. In Oregon and Washington this is no longer the case. In 1990, rates of children living in single-parent families were virtually equal between the area's metro and nonmetro counties. Using data from the 1980 and 1990 censuses, this research investigates whether different types of nonmetro counties in the area varied in the increasing percent of children in these families between 1980 and 1990 and finds that this rise was ubiquitous across nonmetro county types. It also investigates factors that help explain the variation in the percent of area nonmetro children in single-parent families in 1990. One set of variables comes from past research on national and metro data sets on family instability. Two variables from this past research were important. An increasing percent of men in the labor force during the decade had...