American families: 75 years of change (EXCERPT), Monthly Labor Review Online, Mar. 1990

American families: 75 years of change
James R. Wetzel

Families are the quintessential institution of our Nation, providing biological and social continuity as they simultaneously shape, and are shaped by, the larger society. Families also are the locus of consumption, savings, and some production activities that are vital to our overall economic well-being, and they bear special responsibilities for nurturing and educating the Nation's future work force, a critical function that is not well-served by the deterioration of the nuclear family over the past 25 or more years.

Each of us has a concept of the typical family and how it has changed over time. Being rooted in our own family experience and community, our views are seldom, if ever, an accurate depiction of the typical family. Indeed, it is fair to say that there is no such thing as a "typical" family. In a nation as heterogeneous as the United States, the characteristics of families vary dramatically by race and ethnicity; education, age, and income of the adult members of the family; religious affiliation; region of the country; and by the interplay of these and other demographic, social, and economic factors. However, over the 75 years since first publication of the Monthly Labor Review, there have been dramatic secular changes that are observable in most subgroups of the Nation's population. Among the most visible of those changes:

Today, relatively fewer of us are living in family households, and particularly in "traditional" nuclear families, than did so earlier in the 20th century. The trend toward living in nonfamily households (usually alone) is associated with widowhood at older ages, the increased incidence of divorce among adults of all ages, and delayed marriage among young adults.
Women in the United States are bearing fewer children during their lives, and they are doing so later in their reproductive years. Consequently, the average size of families today is smaller than it has ever been before. The Nation's total fertility rate—the number of children the average woman would be expected to bear in her lifetime—has been below the replacement level since 1972.
Those who live in family households—still a very substantial majority of the population—live in less stable, more heterogeneous families than did earlier generations. Kinship networks now often include former spouses and former in-laws, stepchildren, and, with increased life expectancy, more generations than was typical earlier in this century.
Finally, economic roles within the family have shifted significantly in the post-World War II years. In particular, regardless of the presence of children, including infants, wives now are more likely to work outside the home than to work solely as homemaker. (See Howard V. Hayghe, "Family members in the work force," pp. 14-19.)

This excerpt is from an article published in the March 1990 issue of the Monthly Labor Review. The full text of the article is available in Adobe Acrobat's Portable Document Format (PDF). See How to view a PDF file for more information.

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