Changes in Marital Status and Poverty Dynamics among Young Mothers in the United States

Teresa Mauldin, University of Georgia
Yoko Mimura, University of Georgia

How do changes in young mothers' marital status relate to the likelihood of exiting from and reentering into poverty? Does marrying get them out of poverty as strongly as being unmarried puts them back into poverty? Using two-way transition models from event history analysis and a sample of young mothers who experienced poverty from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 data, we will address these questions. We expect to find that getting married in a year is associated with the increased likelihood of exiting poverty in the year and with decreased likelihood of going back into poverty. Being unmarried is hypothesized to be associated with an increased likelihood of reentering poverty and decreased likelihood of exiting from poverty when other conditions are kept equal. We also expect that the economic benefit of marrying for young mothers is smaller than the negative economic consequences from being unmarried.