|
(last
updated May 2003)
|
Introduction and OverviewThe United
States has no explicit national, comprehensive family or
child policy, nor has there been any such policy or cluster
of policies in the past. Nonetheless, over the past century,
even as European welfare states were being shaped, the US
too developed many of the institutional supports and commitments
to what in Europe would be called a welfare state. Among
these, from time to time, were measures directed at children
or families with children, which might be said to constitute
implicit child and family policies. These enactments were
in considerable part concentrated in several 'bursts' during
periods of reform: the Progressive Era (approximately 1895-1920),
the New Deal and its aftermaths (1932-54), the War on Poverty
and the Great Society (1960-74). A hundred years after the
Progressive Era, at the beginning of the Clinton Administration,
there were new child and family initiatives, but by the
middle of Clinton's term a wave of conservative reaction
had begun to dismantle a sixty-year history of increasing
social entitlements. Nonetheless, the picture was mised
in the final Clinton years and the early George W. Bush
years because of a good economy, improved EITC (see below),
child care expansion, and some state programs build on welfare
reform. However, bedgetary and social policy in the latter
part of the first bush term cut back on and constrained
programs important to families and their children.
To the extent that the US has implicit child/family policies,
they can be identified and assessed only in the context
of social policy more broadly defined; and they can be understood
only with reference to a tradition that has included several
major elements:
· A strong value is placed on individualism;
· The separation of Church and State in order to
be receptive to diverse religions and ensure their freedom;
· Protection of the family as a private unit and
a stress on avoiding government interference with family
matters;
· Puritanism and related Protestant religious streams
that stressed that one could legislate to prevent evil but
that 'goodness' had to be voluntary. As a result, voluntarism
as opposed to statutory enactment was favored for social
welfare.
· Social Darwinism, a mid-nineteenth-century "scientific"
belief that emphasized that survival of the fittest was
the 'natural' order and that societal intervention into
the process was counter-productive.
· A history of slavery followed by 'emancipation'
after the Civil War (1865) followed a century later by landmark
legislation during the civil rights movement of the 1960s;
but strong strains of racism remain.
· A strict work ethic as central to the value system;
· A relatively open immigration policy, which created
population growth while reducing, perhaps eliminating, any
case for pro-natalist policies.
· A limited role for the federal government, until
late in the nineteenth century. Washington was not believed
to have responsibilities in the social sector, which was
considered to be the province of the states.
· Laissez-faire economic and social policy ('liberalism'
in the European sense) and an emphasis on the market as
the dominant ideology that would bring a society growth
and prosperity.
· The late development of a civil service and government
bureaucracy, which limited the national government's capacity
for social policy and raised doubts about the quality of
states' efforts.
· An ambivalence after World War II regarding women's
roles, in particular whether public policy should take a
position of encouraging women with young children to remain
at home, providing care for their children, or to enter
the work-force, helping to sustain family income (Kamerman
& Kahn, 1997; OECD, 2001).
Historically, these themes have played out in various ways
as economic, social, and political contexts changed with
the settlement of the continent and the evolution of the
economy through the industrial revolution to a post-industrial
society, and as demographic and social change led to major
shifts in the family. The point of departure was poor law
following the British tradition and experience, tempered
by a strong and important voluntary middle-class charitable
movement that first emerged in the nineteenth century, compensating
for the limitations of poor law and aiding those considered
more 'helpable' and 'deserving'.
Within this context, social policies affecting children
and their families focused first on the unfortunate, the
handicapped, and the most severely deprived; and second,
on the poor. Except for free and compulsory public education,
a development in which the US was among the leaders internationally,
the US was late in its development of social policy for
children generally. Overall, it has placed a heavy emphasis
on services and other in-kind benefits for the vulnerable
and poor. As for improving the economic situation of families
with children, the policy has been largely one of ending
almost all taxation of the poor except for social security
payroll taxes, offering modest and inconsistent cash benefits
to some low-income families and tax benefits to the middle
and upper classes.
Family benefits and services (TANF, EITC, federal child
care subsidies) expended.64 % of GDP in 1995.
|
Highlights
Click here to view or
print country highlights in pdf format.
Return
to Top
|
Government Agencies
The US child and family-related policies are divided across
federal, state, and local government lines and fragmented
across functional policy domains. The major federal departments
with responsibilities for the various component policies
are: Department of Health and Human Services (for health,
welfare, early childhood care services, child welfare services);
Department of Education (for certain aspects of education);
Department of Labor (for the Family and Medical Leave policy);
the Department of Agriculture (for food stamps); the Department
of Housing (for housing vouchers); the Department of Justice
(for juvenile delinquency); the Department of the Treasury
(for tax benefits); and the Social Security Administration
(for survivor's benefits, benefits for disabled children,
etc). The major state level agencies vary in name across
state lines but include, for the most part: a department
of welfare or social services (that includes welfare and
personal social services), or employment and social services
(including child care); a department of education; a department
of health; a department of mental health; and, in some states,
a department of child and family services.
Return
to Top
|
Demographic and Other Social Trends
According to government reports, the U.S. has a population
of 285.1 million (2002) making it the largest country in
the OECD and equal to more than three-quarters of the population
of the entire pre-expansion European Union (EU). In 2000,
the U.S. had a larger population than all countries except
China and India. It is significantly younger than the EU
countries, with 12+ percent of its population made up of
the post-65 elderly in contrast to a 16 percent EU average.
Some 21.3 percent of the U.S. population consist of children
under 15, in contrast to a 16.8 percent EU average.
As is well known, the U.S. is a country that continues
to admit a large number of immigrants each year, about 800,000
legally, annually over the past two decades, mostly from
Latin America and Asia. In the year 2000, 10.4 percent of
the U.S. population (30.5 million people) were foreign born,
half from Latin America, 27.1 percent from Asia, and 16.1
percent from Europe. It is estimated that there were 8-9
million illegal immigrants in the country, more than half
from Mexico. Thus the U.S. is a quite heterogeneous country
racially and ethnically, with a large portion of its population
consisting of Blacks (12.3 percent), Hispanics (12.5 percent),
and Asians (3.8 percent). It is religiously diverse as well.
Within the child population, 65 percent are White, 15 percent
are Black, 15 percent Hispanic (of any races), and 5 percent
Asian.
The U.S. has a higher marriage rate and a higher divorce
rate than the EU countries. Its out-of-wedlock birth rate
is high (33 percent in 1999), but not as high as the Nordic
countries, France, Ireland, and the U.K. However, it has
a higher teen out-of-wedlock birth rate than EU or other
OECD countries, even though rates have declined steadily
in the 1990's, as have teen pregnancies. The U.S. cohabitation
rate is not as high as rates in North Europe, but is increasing
rapidly; there were 3.8 million unmarried-partner household
in 2000, 3.7 percent of all U.S. households. Of these, 40
percent included children. Some 31 percent of families are
lone-parent families, higher than EU or other OECD families,
except for the U.K. Some 25 percent of children lived with
one unmarried parent, mostly the mother, in 1996 (but some
of these may be in covert cohabitation). Of lone mothers,
43.2 percent are single, 17.7 percent separated, 35 percent
divorced, and 4 percent widowed. Most children (71 percent
under 18) live with both parents. Others are in "blended"
households, with stepparents, in adoptive homes, and in
extended households.
At. 2.0 in 2001, the U.S. total fertility rate is slightly
below the replacement level. It was at replacement (2.1)
a few years earlier, very unusual in the industrial world
(equal to Iceland), and exceeded in the OECD only by Mexico
and Turkey.
Female labor force participation is about 71 percent, well
above the EU and OECD averages, a rate exceeded only in
Finland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Iceland. Over half
of all families with children are two-parent, two-earner
families. More than two-thirds of all married women with
children are in the labor force, and three quarters of lone
mothers, some 61 percent of wives with children under 6
are in the labor force. Some 59 percent of mothers are back
at work before their children are one. Two-thirds of the
working mothers of the under-6's work full time.
Return
to Top
|
Social Protection
The US is, relatively, a high GDP, high per capita GDP,
and low "total taxation" country compared to EU
and OECD averages. The government expenditure proportion
is also relatively lower.
The US was a laggard in the development of national social
policies, following the European countries in the development
of federal social insurance schemes by about 30 - 50 years.
The enactment of the Social Security Act in 1935 marked
the beginning of a social role for the federal government.
In many senses, US national social policy can be described
and understood in the context of that legislation and its
subsequent amendments. The law provides for all the basic
social protection regimes except for family allowances and
national health insurance. The elderly are well protected
as are the disabled, while in contrast, children and families
with children have no universal social insurance entitlement,
no national minimum income, and no universal health care.
Only a means-tested federal-state, cash-benefit program
is available to some poor families with children and a means-tested
voucher for purchasing food, and a national means-tested
program for poor families with a disabled or handicapped
child. With a GDP that is the highest in the OECD group
($8.2 trillion) and a per capita GDP that is second highest,
after Luxembourg, the US investment in social protection
is significantly lower than that of the other EU countries
(about 16 percent of GDP excluding education, as in the
EU statistics). However, when private expenditures are added
to public, the US total investment is more like that of
the EU countries, significantly lower (24.9 percent of GDP)
than Sweden (34.8 percent) and Denmark and Finland (32 and
30 percent), but only a bit below other OECD leaders. Unemployment
rates are significantly below the OECD average and less
that half that of the EU average. Using the U.S. measure
of absolute poverty, the child poverty rate in 1998 was
19 percent, significantly higher than throughout the 1970s.
Using the standard relative poverty rate applied internationally
(below 50 percent of median income), the rate was 22 percent
in the mid-1990s, at the bottom or next to the bottom of
the rankings in other countries, just above Mexico in a
group of 23 countries. The US has the highest child poverty
in lone-parent families among the same group (UNICEF, 2000;
Adema, 2001).
Return
to Top
|
Child, Youth and Family Policies
Maternity, Paternity, Parental, and Family Leaves
The U.S. has no national maternity, paternity, or parental
leave policy. It does have an unpaid family leave and five
states (California, Hawaii, New Jersey, New York, and Rhode
Island) have a paid temporary or short term disability benefit
that covers pregnancy and maternity as well, typically for
about 10-12 weeks. Many employers offer maternity leaves
under temporary disability plans through company policy
or collective bargaining agreements. The Family and Medical
Leave Act (FMLA) was enacted in 1993 and requires that businesses
with 50 or more employees provide 12 weeks a year of job-protected,
but unpaid, leave to qualified employees (those who have
worked at least 1250 hours in the prior year), for birth,
adoption, foster care, or personal or family illness. Employers
must also continue to provide health insurance (if provided
before). In 2000, the President recommended that states
use unemployment insurance to provide a cash benefit that
would partially replace wages forgone while on leave. The
Department of Labor has issued regulations permitting states
to implement such a policy and California enacted legislation
in 2002. President Bush has moved to rescind the regulation
in 2003; in any case, high unemployment has made unemployment
funds less available. President Clinton recommended expanding
the FMLA to cover firms with 25 or more employees and to
permit parents to take up to 24 hours of leave a year to
visit a child's school or take a child to a doctor. As yet,
despite initiatives in some states, the situation is essentially
unchanged.
Return
to Top
|
Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC)
The U.S. has no national system of ECEC nor does any state
have a statewide coherent policy or program. Most children
begin primary school at age 6 but compulsory school begins
at various ages across the states from 5-8. Almost all children
attend kindergarten at age 5, the year before they enter
primary school, largely under public auspices. ECEC policy
includes the whole range of government actions designed
to influence the supply of and/or demand for ECEC and the
quality of services provided. These government activities
include direct delivery of ECEC services; direct and indirect
financial subsidies to private providers, such as grants,
contracts, and tax incentives; financial subsidies to parents
both direct and indirect, such as cash benefits and vouchers
to pay for the services, or tax benefits to offset the costs,
and the establishment and enforcement of regulations. ECEC
programs that serve children under age 5 may be classified
in several different ways. They include a wide range of
part-day and full-day programs under education and social
welfare auspices, funded and delivered in a variety of ways
in both the public and private (for-profit and non-profit
sectors). They include pre- or pre-primary schools (pre-kindergartens,
compensatory education programs, and nursery schools), childcare
or day care centers, family-type day care homes (both regulated
and unregulated), before- and after-school programs, and
family support programs (child-centered, family-focused,
neighborhood-based programs offering a cluster of services
to families with very young children). Federal funding is
largely targeted on low-income children and children with
disabilities. The major sources of federal funds include
funds to subsidize child care for families leaving welfare
for work, compensatory education funds (Head Start and Early
Head Start), a tax credit to offset some ECEC costs, and
funds transferred from TANF (see below). Parent fees cover
about 75 percent of costs. In 1996, 61 percent of children
aged 3-5 were enrolled in some form of center-based or pre-primary
school program and about 31 percent of the under 3s. A later
report specified that 61 percent of the under 4s were in
regularly scheduled care: 44% under 1; 53% age 1; 57% age
2 (National Research Council, 2001).
The U.S. was part of a 2000 OECD review of ECEC in twelve
countries. Consult the full American report on line or download
in at: http://www1.oecd.org/els/pdfs/EDSECECDOCA012.pdf
Return
to Top
|
Family Allowances
No child or family allowance is provided in the U.S. There
are, however, tax benefits contingent on the presence of
child (see below).
|
Child and Family Tax Benefits
There is a personal exemption in the Federal income tax
of $3,000 per dependent for 2002, a total decreased somewhat
for high-income. The earned income tax credit (EITC) is
a refundable tax credit for low earners and can refund as
much as $2,506 per family with one child and $4,140 for
families with two or more children. It phases out gradually
for those with total earned incomes over $14,600. Some eleven
states supplement this encouragement to work with their
own EITC's.
A variety of tax benefits and credits aid parents of students
at all educational levels, particularly for college, and
include: tax deductibility within limits of qualified educational
loans; IRA savings for future educational expenses; college
savings plans; other educational expenses in low-earner
families, etc.
During the Clinton years, the U.S. enacted its first "child
allowance" alternative, a $400 (later $500) per child
tax credit for families with incomes above the tax threshold.
(It was argued that those below the threshold had the refundable
EITC). The credit will be $600 per child for 2001-2004,
gradually rising to $1,000 in 2010. As of 2001, the credit
is refundable to the extent of 10% of earner income in excess
of $10,000, indexed for inflation. The Congress in considering
a proposal to raise the credit to $1,000 in 2003.
Finally, there has been a dependent care tax credit, which
applies to child care, refunding 30 percent of up to $2,400
of expenditures for one child and 30 percent of up to $4,800
for two or more. After 2002 the 30 percent rose to 35, but
there are cutbacks as adjusted gross incomes rise.
There is a one-time credit for adoption expenses, phased
out for moderately high earners.
|
Child Support
The US policy is one of stressing the enforcement of the
child support obligation of the non-custodial/non-resident
parent. Court-ordered support awards may be carried out
through automatic withholding of payment from the parent's
wages and tax refunds. There is also a growing trend toward
the use of a formula in setting child support awards, for
example, 17 percent of income for one child, 25 percent
for two, 29 percent for 3.
Nonetheless, of custodial mothers in 1999, while 62.2 percent
were awarded child support by the courts, 45.9 percent of
this group actually received full payments and 74.6 percent
received some, diminished payment. Poverty rates were high
for custodial mothers receiving no or only part of the payment
due (Grall, 2002).
|
Other Child Conditioned Income Transfers
The most important income transfers for families with children
are: the tax benefits described above; means-tested cash
and in-kind benefits, and Survivor's benefits under social
security.
Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) is a means-tested
cash benefit funded by the federal government with contributions
by the states as well, through grants to the states permitting
states great flexibility in providing cash assistance to
poor families with children (or if the mother is pregnant).
. TANF has a 5-year lifetime limit on receipt, requires
poor women with children aged 3 months and older to participate
in work after a maximum of two years, stresses marriage
and the reduction of out-of-wedlock pregnancy and childbearing,
and has a series of other requirements some of which vary
across the states.
A second important income transfer program of importance
to poor children is Food Stamps, the in-kind benefit (a
voucher) designed to increase the food purchasing power
of eligible low-income families. Families are eligible if
at least one member is seeking work or employed, and have
gross monthly income under 130 percent of the poverty threshold.
A third important benefit is Supplemental Security Income
(SSI), a means-tested cash benefit provided by the federal
government to poor and disabled children as well as other
poor, blind or disabled adults and aged. As in other countries,
children in the US are also entitled to Survivor's benefits
under social security.
Return to Top
|
Child and Adolescent Health
Despite the highest total health expenditures as a portion
of GDP in the OECD, there is no national health insurance
program in the U.S., nor a universal child health program.
There is a federal/state health assistance program for low-income
children and their families (Medicaid) and a federal/state
special funding stream for health care for low-income children
not otherwise covered by health insurance (SCHIP). All poor
children under 19 are covered by Medicaid unless already
covered under some other health insurance program.
Infant mortality rates (6.9 in 2002) are comparatively
high vis a vis (pre-expansion) EU countries (average 4.9).
Immunization levels are among the OECD leaders.
|
Youth
Youth unemployment rates for males and females under age
25 are similar, slightly under 11 percent for females and
slightly over for males. There is particular concern regarding
non-marital teen pregnancy and parenting and a major policy
emphasis on encouraging sexual abstinence.
The United States was one of the fourteen countries participating
in the OECD thematic review, From Initial
Education to Working Life - Making Transitions Work
. For more detail on the transition to working life in the
U.S., see OECD's background
report on the United States.
Return
to Top
|
Reconciliation of Work and Family Life
Reconciliation of work and family life is an important
issue in public discussion but not in enacted public policy.
The stress is on employer responsiveness to a changing workforce,
and the provision of flexible benefits, and childcare-related
benefits and services, but none of this is a matter of statutory
provision. Some employers have responsive policies and there
are tax incentives for employer child-care. The discussions
concerning the FMLA and ECEC are often premised on the importance
of the issue, but apparently the continued ambivalence regarding
women's roles or the over-reliance on market forces contributes
to the lack of policy attention directed to this issue.
Return
to Top
|
|
Housing
The Federal government provides housing aid indirectly
to lower income households in the form of housing block
grants to state and local government that may use the funds
for various housing assistance activities including rent
subsidies. There is limited public housing (1.2 million
units) and a number of other special programs (1.4 million
vouchers and project-based subsidies), however, coverage
does not begin to include all those who are eligible. In
addition, extensive tax benefits are available for house
or apartment owners in the form of deductibility of mortgage
interest and local property taxes- constituting the largest
government subsidies to the housing system. Less than three
percent of all housing is publicly subsidized according
to Peter Marcuse, a Columbia University expert. Only 5+
million families have rent subsidies through public housing
or a tenant/landlord voucher system ("Section 8").
|
References
Adema, W. (2001). Net social expenditures,(2nd Ed).
Paris: OECD.
Grall, t. (2002). Custodial mothers and fathers and their
child support. U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population
Reports, pp. 60-217.
Kamerman, S.B. & Gatenio, S. (2002). Overview of the
current policy context. In D. Cryer & R. Clifford (Eds.),
Early childhood education and care in the USA. (pp.
1-29). Baltimore, Maryland: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co.
Kamerman, S.B. & Kahn, A.J. (1997). Family change and
family policies in the United States. In S. B. Kamerman
& A.J. Kahn (Eds.), Family change and family policies
in Great Britain, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States.
Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
Kamerman, S.B. & Kahn, A.J. (1995). Starting right.
New York: Oxford University Press.
National Research Council. (2001). Getting to positive
outcomes for children in child care. Washington, D.C.:
National Academy Press.
OECD. (2001). Thematic review on early childhood education
and care: Background paper on in the United States.
Paris: Author.
OECD. (2000). From initial education to working life-Making
transitions work. Paris: Author.
OECD. (2000). Thematic review of the transition from
initial education to working life: United States background
report. Paris: Author.
UNICEF. (2000). Child poverty in rich nations. Florence:
Innocenti Center.
U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Ways and Means.
(2000). The Green Book. Washington, D.C.: GPO.
|
|
Introduction and Overview
Highlights
Government Agencies
Demographic and Other Social
Trends
Social Protection
Maternity, Paternity,Parental,
and Family Leaves
Early Childhood Education and Care
(ECEC)
Family Allowances
Child and Family Tax
Benefits
Child Support
Other Child Conditioned
Income Transfers
Child and Adolescent Health
Housing
Youth
Reconciliation of
Work and Family Life
|
|
|
|
|
