Changing American Family

When Americans consider families, many of them think of a “traditional family”. A traditional family is one in which both parents are living together with their children. The father goes out and works and the mother stays home and rears the children. The biggest change in families in the United States is that most families today do not fit this image. Today, one out of three American families is a “traditional family” in this sense.

The most common type of family now is one in which both parents work outside the home. In 1950, only 20 per cent of all American families had both parents working outside the home. Today, it is 60 per cent. Even women with young children are going back to work. About 51 per cent of women with children younger than one year old now work outside the home.

Another big change is the increase in the number of families that are headed by only one person, usually the mother.

Between 1970 and 1988, the number of single-parent families more than doubled – from 3.8 million to 9.4 million. In 1988, nearly one out of every four children under 18 lived with only one parent.

Some families look even less like the typical traditional family. They may consist of a couple of one race who have adopted children of another race, or from another country. In many states, single people may also adopt children. Some people take in foster children – children whose parents cannot take care of them.

Another change is that families in the United States are getting smaller. In the mid-1700s, there were six people in the average household. Today the average household contains between two and three people. A household is defined as any place where at least one person is living.

One recent change is that the number of marriages is rising. The number of babies born also has been climbing steadily for the past 10 years. Many experts see these trends as a sign that Americans are returning to the values of marriage and family.

History of the American Family

To understand why these changes are happening, let us look at the history of the family in the United States.

When the United States was established, more than 200 years ago, it was a big, sparsely settled country. Earlier, this land had been a colony of Great Britain. For many years the immigrants who settled in the United States were nearly all of European origin, but later people came to the United States from all over the world. Life was hard for these early families. The average marriage in colonial America lasted only 10 years because many people died young. Few people lived to be older than 60. A widow or widower often remarried many times. Even with today’s high rate of divorce, many marriages last longer now than marriages did in the 1700s.

Later, Americans began settling the American West. They were looking for land to farm and for a better life. They left behind their homes, their relatives and their friends. When these settlers said good-bye to the people they loved, usually it was forever. These first settlers of the Midwest and the great Plains of the north-western United States were isolated; often their nearest neighbor was many miles away. Family member had to work together and to depend on each other to survive.

The family formed an important economic group. All of its members helped to bring food and money into the home. They worked on a farm, planting and harvesting, or they worked making goods to sell at a market. Few people got married as a result of love or affection alone. Most people married because they needed a family in order to make a living. When people married, often they looked for the husband or wife who could bring the most material goods into the marriage. In colonial America, men who did not marry were heavily taxed. Almost 99 per cent of the population married.

Many changes came to families when the United States shifted from being mainly a farming nation to being an industrial nation. This happened in the late 1800s. In 1820, fewer than eight per cent of Americans lived in cities. By 1900, about 40 per cent of all people lived in cities. People began earning their money outside the home in factories. Instead of getting married on the basis of economic need, people could marry primarily for love.

As men and women became less dependent on their families for a livelihood, the number of divorces began to increase. Between 1900 and 1920, the divorce rate doubled; in 1900, there were four divorces for every l,000 married couples. This trend alarmed people, but divorce was not new. The first divorce in the United States occurred in l639 and involved a man who had married two women. Still, divorce was difficult. A wife was her husband’s property. If a husband abused his wife, she had few alternatives and sometimes a wife, or even a husband, would run away from a bad marriage.

The decade of the 1950s is thought to have been the most family-oriented period in American history. People praised and glorified families. Hundreds of thousand of young couples married. They married at the youngest ages in the history of the United States. In the 1950s, by the time men and women reached 27 years old, more than two-thirds of them were married. Today fewer than half of all 27-year-olds are married.

The 1950s was also a “baby boom” time, with very high birth rates. In one year alone more than 4.3 million babies were born. The average mother had more than three children; today the average mother has one or two children.

Today, some people look at the American family of the 1950s as a model or as a goal for the family. Many experts, however, see the 1950s as an exceptional period. They say that the marriage and family patterns of Americans today are closer to those prevalent during the rest of American history than was the pattern of the 1950s.

Slowly some of the values accepted during the 1950s began to change. During the 1960s and the 1970s, some women found that they wanted more from life than rearing children, and caring for household matters. Women began to see that they had choices. They could have a job or a family, or both. More women began taking jobs. According to the magazine. U.S. News and World Report, the number of families in which both husbands and wives worked grew by four million during the 1970s.

The period of the late 1970s and early 1980s has also been called the decade of the “me generation”. This is a time in which people have explored new ways of living. In the 1970s many couples began living together without being married. These couples questioned why they needed a marriage license.

For about 10 years, the number of unmarried couples living together grew rapidly. Birth control also became more widely accepted. Couples were able to choose when they wanted to start a family.

Other changes also occurred. One change was an increase in divorces. In 1970, there were 47 divorces for every l.000 married couples. By 1980, this number had grown to 114 divorces for every 1.000 married couples.

In the mid-1980s, more traditional marriage and family practices returned. Today, married couples are the fastest growing type of household in the United States. Women and men are rediscovering the joys of home and family life. Even leaders who speak out strongly for women’s rights are modifying their views regarding the relative importance of the family.

Looking at the history of families in the United States helps to explain how the American family is changing. But what do these changes mean? Are they good or bad? In order to understand, let us look at what is behind these numbers.