Shirahase Sawako, Raymo James M
University of Tokyo.
University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Soc Forces. 2014 Dec;93(2):545-569. doi: 10.1093/sf/sou077. Epub 2014 Jul 25.
Single mothers' relatively high levels of poverty are well documented, but the role that intergenerational coresidence may play in mitigating this disadvantage is not well understood. In this paper, we use multiple rounds of a large national survey between 1986 and 2007 ( = 67,252) to evaluate the extent to which income sharing via intergenerational coresidence limits poverty among single mothers in Japan. Results indicate that conventional poverty rates based on single-mother households overstate the prevalence of poverty among single mothers by 12-20 percent as a result of excluding those who are coresiding with parents. We find no evidence that the prevalence of intergenerational coresidence has changed in a way that would offset the poverty-increasing effect of growth in single parenthood. Finally, we show not only that shared income is the most important factor in limiting poverty among single mothers living with parents, but also that many single mothers are coresiding with parents who are themselves economically disadvantaged. We discuss the implications of our findings for understanding relationships between rapid family change and poverty in countries like Japan, where public income support for single mothers is limited and where family support via intergenerational coresidence is both common and normative.
单亲母亲相对较高的贫困水平有充分的文献记载，但代际共居在减轻这种不利状况中可能发挥的作用却没有得到很好的理解。在本文中，我们利用1986年至2007年间多次进行的一项大型全国性调查（样本量 = 67252）来评估通过代际共居实现的收入共享在多大程度上限制了日本单亲母亲的贫困状况。结果表明，由于排除了与父母共居的单亲母亲，基于单亲家庭的传统贫困率将单亲母亲中的贫困发生率高估了12%至20%。我们没有发现证据表明代际共居的发生率发生了变化，从而抵消单亲家庭增加带来的贫困加剧效应。最后，我们不仅表明共享收入是限制与父母共居的单亲母亲贫困的最重要因素，而且还表明许多单亲母亲与经济上处于弱势的父母共居。我们讨论了我们的研究结果对于理解像日本这样的国家中快速的家庭变化与贫困之间关系的意义，在日本，对单亲母亲的公共收入支持有限，而通过代际共居提供的家庭支持既普遍又规范。
