Why Are So Many U.S. Mothers Becoming Their Family’s Primary Economic Support?

In Why Are So Many U.S. Mothers Becoming Their Family’s Primary Economic Support?, Joanna Pepin, Kimberly McErlean, Jennifer Glass, and R. Kelly Raley use 1996–2000 and 2013–2016 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) data to establish that, in the U.S., mothers’ annual transitions to primary-earning status increased by nearly 50% over these two decades. Their analysis finds that, contrary to common assumptions, instability in marital and cohabiting relationships does not explain the increasing number of mothers who become primary earners each year. The article identifies other pathways to primary earner status for mothers, and their implications for developing supportive social policy.

Joanna Pepin is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto. As a family sociologist, she explores how couple and family relations reproduce and protect against inequality. Dr. Pepin’s current projects investigate what constitutes an “equal” relationship and how work and family arrangements relate to mental health.

Citation

Pepin, J. R., McErlean, K., Glass, J. L., & Raley, R. K. (2024). Why Are So Many U.S. Mothers Becoming Their Family’s Primary Economic Support? Demography, 61(6), 1793–1817. https://doi.org/10.1215/00703370-11646286

Abstract

Although the growing prevalence of primary-earning mothers is well established, this article uses 1996 and 2014 Survey of Income and Program Participation data to show U.S. mothers’ rate of transition to primary-earner status increased by nearly 50% over the observed period. The rate of transition to primary earning predominantly increased among mothers with some college experience and mothers racialized as White, largely catching up to the rate among mothers identifying as Black. A decomposition analysis determined that relationship instability in marital and cohabiting relationships accounts for less than 20% of the increased transition rate, although somewhat more for Hispanic mothers. Roughly 75% of the growth in maternal primary-earning spells was attributed to situations in which the mother’s earnings increased in isolation or, for mothers with a partner, often paired with a decrease in the partner’s earnings. This latter circumstance was particularly the case for mothers identifying as Black or Asian. Findings show that most of the growth in mothers becoming primary earners from the mid-1990s to the mid-2010s occurred not because mothers experienced more household economic changes (frequency), but because household economic changes often increased mothers’ relative financial contributions (impact). The impact component accounted for the entire increased transition rate across mothers’ educational attainment and racial and ethnic identity.