Understanding Illegitimacy
Andrew and I spoke about this on the last edition of Strictly Right Radio, but the entire article is worth the read. It explains how the left has a vested interest in destroying the institution of marriage in order to continue the rapid growth of the welfare state.
From the Heritage Foundation:
The press has rushed to report a minuscule drop in “teen births” based on data released Tuesday by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). As usual, the mainstream media are focusing on a trivial, politically correct story while ignoring the real story buried in the data.
Here’s the real story: According to CDC, a record 40.6 percent of children born in 2008 were born outside marriage — a total of 1.72 million children. The overwhelming majority of the unwed mothers were young adults with low education levels, precisely the kind of individuals who have the greatest difficulty going it alone in our society.
Only about 7.5 percent of these out-of-wedlock births, 130,000, were to girls under 18. Of course, these births can be disastrous for the girls involved. But as a social problem, teen pregnancies and births are of quite limited importance. By contrast, 1.72 million out-of-wedlock births amount to an overwhelming catastrophe for taxpayers and society.
The steady growth of childbearing by single women and the general collapse of marriage, especially among the poor, lie at the heart of the mushrooming welfare state.
Tags: Crime, Heritage Foundation, Marriage, Single Mothers, Welfare
April 15th, 2010 at 6:00 am
Terrific work! This is the type of information that should be shared around the web. Shame on the search engines for not positioning this post higher!
April 16th, 2010 at 8:18 pm
This is idiotic and intentionally misleading.
Homes with two married biological parents tend to be stable because the couple is happy and choosing to stay together. Forcing unhappy people to stay together “for the children” is often significantly more detrimental to the child(ren)’s development than allowing the couple to separate. This is why we allow divorce.
Yes, people should be encouraged to wait to have children until they are in a position where they will be financially, emotionally, etc. able to support the child(ren). This means they need to have access to contraceptives and family planning services. Additionally, some people (disproportionately inner-city and black in the US) may never be financially capable of providing for a child without outside support, even in a two-parent household. Should these people be prevented from ever having children? I’ve read before on this blog (not sure about Ari, but definitely from Lawton) the judgment that if two people are not prepared to ever have a child, they should not be having sex. So low-income couples (married or unmarried) should not be allowed to have sex? Good luck selling that.
My main issue with this article is its insistence that the “decline of marriage” is responsible for single-parenthood and welfare dependence while systemic racism and unequal access to education are significantly more to blame. Good job ignoring the larger issues (as per usual).
As for the bit about Obama cutting funding to the Healthy Marriage Initiative, I admittedly have not paid much attention to news about the budget but this is surprising considering Obama has spoken favourably about the initiative in the past and in his book The Audacity of Hope. I’ll have to look into that more when I get the chance.
Finally, I’d like to know how you (this being directed at anyone to whom the following statements apply) reconcile being anti-choice AND anti-welfare, while refusing to acknowledge the REAL reasons for the prevalence of unwanted pregnancy and welfare dependence (those being the related issues of systemic racism and unequal access to education), instead blaming this convoluted notion of the “decline of marriage” (which, if anything, is a result of the same issues mentioned earlier, not some crazy leftist welfare state conspiracy). Forcing low-income partners into unhappy marriages is not going to fix the problems of child poverty and welfare dependence. Acknowledging and addressing systemic racism and ensuring equal access to quality education regardless of race, socioeconomic status, etc. will. Both of these will *gasp* require increased government spending NOW if there is any hope of decreasing welfare dependence in the future. Deal with it.
April 30th, 2010 at 11:48 pm
My cousin recommended this blog and she was totally right keep up the fantastic work!