Recent Research Reports and News: November
2003
Fathers—Research | Children
& Families | Fatbers/Mothers
in Prison | Census Data
| Systemic Barriers
| Welfare Reform
| NCOFF Abstracts
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Families Left Behind: The Hidden Costs of Incarceration and
Reentry, Jeremy Travis, Elizabeth M. Cincotta, and Amy L. Solomon,
October 29, 2003.
Abstract:
With incarceration rates in America at record high levels, the criminal
justice system now touches the lives of millions of children each
year. The imprisonment of nearly three quarters of a million parents
disrupts parent-child relationships, alters the networks of familial
support, and places new burdens on governmental services such as schools,
foster care, adoption agencies, and youth-serving organizations. Few
studies have explored the impact of parental incarceration on young
children or identified the needs that arise from such circumstances.
Little attention has focused on how communities, social service agencies,
health care providers, and the criminal justice system can work collaboratively
to better meet the needs of the families left behind. This policy
brief is intended to help focus attention on the hidden costs of our
criminal justice policies.
To obtain a copy of the complete report in PDF format, visit
the Urban
Institute's web site.
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The Mark of Criminal Record, Devah Pager, Center for Demography
and Ecology, University of Wisconsin, 2003.
Author Abstract:
Over the past three decades, the number of prison inmates has increased
by more than 500 percent, leaving the United States the country with
the highest incarceration rate in the world. With over 2 million individuals
currently incarcerated, and over half a million prisoners released
each year, the large and growing numbers of men being processed through
the criminal justice system raises important questions about the consequences
of this massive institutional intervention. This paper focuses on
the consequences of incarceration for the employment outcomes of black
and white job seekers. In the present study, I adopt an experimental
audit approach to formally test the degree to which a criminal record
affects subsequent employment opportunities. By using matched pairs
of individuals to apply for real entry-level jobs, it becomes possible
to directly measure the extent to which a criminal record?in the absence
of other disqualifying characteristics?serves as a barrier to employment
among equally qualified applicants. I find that a criminal record
is associated with a 50 percent reduction in employment opportunities
for whites and a 64 percent reduction for blacks. These findings reveal
an important, and much under-recognized, mechanism of stratification.
A criminal record presents a major barrier to employment, with important
implications for racial disparities.
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Does Amount of Time Spent in Child Care Predict Socioemotional
Adjustment During the Transition to Kindergarten? Early Child
Care Research Network, National Institute of Child Health and Human
Development, Child Development 74 (4), 976-1005,
July 2003.
SRCD Abstract:
To examine relations between time in nonmaternal care through the
first 4.5 years of life and children's socioemotional adjustment,
data on social competence and problem behavior were examined when
children participating in the National Institute of Child Health and
Human Development (NICHD) Study of Early Child Care were 4.5 years
of age and when in kindergarten. The more time children spent in any
of a variety of nonmaternal care arrangements across the first 4.5
years of life, the more externalizing problems and conflict with adults
they manifested at 54 months of age and in kindergarten, as reported
by mothers, caregivers, and teachers. These effects remained, for
the most part, even when quality, type, and instability of child care
were controlled, and when maternal sensitivity and other family background
factors were taken into account. The magnitude of quantity of care
effects were modest and smaller than those of maternal sensitivity
and indicators of family socioeconomic status, though typically greater
than those of other features of child care, maternal depression, and
infant temperament. There was no apparent threshold for quantity effects.
More time in care not only predicted problem behavior measured on
a continuous scale in a dose-response pattern but also predicted at-risk
(though not clinical) levels of problem behavior, as well as assertiveness,
disobedience, and aggression.
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The More Things Change? Children's Living Arrangements since
Welfare Reform, Gregory Acs and Sandi Nelson, Urban Institute,
October 6, 2003.
Abstract:
The share of children five and under living with single mothers declined
from 21.0 percent in 1997 to 17.3 percent in 2002. The share of young
children living with married parents increased by 2.5 percentage points
between 1997 and 2002. The share living with unmarried parents increased
by 1.2 percentage points.
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Children in Kinship Care, Fact Sheet, Urban Institute,
October 9, 2003.
Excerpt:
2.3 million children lived in kinship care in 2002. This includes
all children living with relatives without a parent present. There
are three types of kinship care arrangements:
- Private Kinship Care (1,760,000 children). The family made this
arrangement privately, without the involvement of a social service
agency.
- Kinship Foster Care (400,000 children). Social services helped place
the child with the relative and a court made the relative responsible
for the child's care.
- Voluntary Kinship Care (140,000 children). Social services helped
place the child with the relative, but the courts were not involved.
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Poverty, Income See Slight Changes; Child Poverty Rate Unchanged,
Census Bureau Reports, U.S. Census Bureau, September 26, 2003.
Press Release Excerpt:
The nation's official poverty rate rose from 11.7 percent in 2001 to 12.1
percent in 2002 and median household money income declined 1.1 percent
in real terms from 2001 to $42,409 in 2002, according to reports released
today by the U.S. Census Bureau. Median earnings increased 1.8 percent
for women who worked full-time, year-round and 1.4 percent for similar
men, and the child poverty rate remained unchanged in spite of the recession.
"Alternative measures of income and poverty, which consider taxes and
the value of noncash benefits, present a more mixed picture of the
nation's economic situation," said Daniel Weinberg, chief of the Census
Bureau's Housing and Household Economic Statistics Division.
Three of four alternative income definitions show no change in median
household income and one -- money income less taxes -- showed a real 0.8
percent decline. All four show a reduction in income inequality.
In contrast to the official poverty measure, all six alternative poverty
measures developed by the Census Bureau in response to recommendations by
the National Academy of Sciences show no change in poverty rates between
2001 and 2002. Also presented are nine additional alternative sets of
estimates, each of which shows an increase in poverty rates between 2001
and 2002.
The alternative estimates, which deduct taxes from money income and add
the value of various noncash benefits (food stamps, school lunches,
housing subsidies, health programs and return on home equity), are
intended to provide a more complete measure of economic well-being than
the official income and poverty concepts, which are based solely on the
amount of money people or households receive during the calendar year.
The reports, Poverty in the United States: 2002 and Income
in the United States: 2002, were released on the Internet. Accompanying
them was Supplemental Measures of Material Well- Being: Expenditures,
Consumption, which presents a description of some possible next
steps in the Census Bureau's decades-long investigation into the measurement
of poverty.
Visit the Census
Bureau web site to obtain the full text of this press release or
the associated reports.
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Marriage Patterns of TANF Recipients: Evidence from New Jersey,
Robert G. Wood, Anu Rangarajan, and John Deke, Mathematica Policy
Research, Inc., October 2003.
Mathematica Abstract:
Based on four rounds of annual follow-up surveys with an early group
of NJ TANF recipients, this brief can help inform recent policy debates
related to welfare and marriage. The study found that marriage is
relatively rare for TANF recipients, with only about 1 in 10 married
and living with a spouse four to five years after entering the program.
However, those who do marry fare better economically, primarily because
their husbands typically worked and made substantial contributions
to family income. However, the marital breakup rate was more than
double the rate for marriages nationally, suggesting that the economic
benefits of marriage may be short-lived.
To obtain a copy of this report in PDF format, visit the Mathematica
web site.
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What's Happening to TANF Leavers Who Are Not Employed?,
Robert G. Wood and Anu Rangarajan, Mathematica Policy Research,
Inc., October 2003.
Mathematica Abstract:
Based on four rounds of annual follow-up
surveys with an early group of NJ TANF recipients, this issue brief
focuses on those who have left the welfare rolls and are not working.
About one in four recipients in this group were in this status throughout
much of the study's follow-up period. The researchers note that the
group is diverse; some recipients have substantial alternative sources
of financial support, such as Supplemental Security Income, unemployment
insurance, or earnings from a spouse or partner. However, those who
lack alternative supports (the "least stable" leavers --
representing about 1 in 10 of this early group) get by on very little
income and are at high risk of extreme economic hardship. Although
relatively few people spend extended periods in this status, a substantial
number spend at least some time in it. Policymakers may want to consider
strategies to help recipients through these difficult periods and
perhaps avoid ending up in them in the first place.
To obtain a copy of this report in PDF format, visit the Mathematica
web site.
New Citations from NCOFF's
FatherLit Database
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