Most Americans say children are better off with a parent at home

PewResearchCentre 10 October 2016
Family First Comment: We’d be interested to see if the view is similar in NZ. Think so.
In nearly half of two-parent households in the U.S. today, children are raised by parents who both work full time. Yet most Americans say that children with two parents are better off when one of them stays home to tend to the family, according to a Pew Research Center survey.

The survey, conducted June 7-July 5 among 4,602 adults on Pew Research Center’s nationally representative American Trends Panel, found that 59% of U.S. adults believe that children with two parents are better off when a parent stays home, while about four-in-ten (39%) say children are just as well off when their parents work outside the home.

A Pew Research Center analysis conducted last year had found that both parents work full time in 46% of two-parent households. By contrast, in 1970, only 31% of these households had both parents employed full time. The most common arrangement at that time, among two-parent households, was a full-time working father and a mother who was not employed.

Among those who think children are better off with a parent at home, about 53% say it doesn’t matter which one stays home, while 45% say it’s better if the mother is the parent who isn’t employed outside the home. Just 2% say it’s better if the father is the parent who stays home.

Men are more likely than women to say that children in two-parent households are better off when a parent stays home (63% vs. 55%). But among those who think a parent should stay home, roughly similar shares of men (46%) and women (43%) say this parent should be the mother.

The view that children are better off when one parent doesn’t work outside the home is particularly common among older Americans. But even among those under age 30, fully 54% hold this view. And younger men are far more likely than younger women to say children are better off with a parent at home (62% vs. 46%).

Blacks are less likely than whites and Hispanics to say that children are better off with a parent staying home. Some 45% of blacks believe that children are better off when a parent stays home. About six-in-ten whites (59%) and two-thirds of Hispanics (66%) feel this way.
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