FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
                              THURSDAY, JUNE 12, 2003
                                                  
Robert Bernstein                                                 CB03-97
Public Information Office                                                       
(301) 763-3030/457-3670 (fax)
(301) 457-1037 (TDD)                           Detailed tables
e-mail: pio@census.gov                        Quotes & radio sound bites

Two Married Parents the Norm


                About 7-in-10 Children Live With Their Parents,
              According to Census Bureau Pre-Father's Day Release

   A ratio of about 7-in-10 of the nation's 72.3 million children under 18
lived with two parents last year, according to data released today by the
Commerce Department's Census Bureau.

   Children under 15 represented 84 percent of the 49.7 million children
under 18 living with two parents. Of these, about 11 million lived with
"stay-at-home" moms and only 189,000 with "stay-at-home" dads, according
to the report, Children's Living Arrangements and Characteristics:
March 2002 [PDF 521K].

   On the other hand, 19.8 million children under 18 lived with one
parent: 16.5 million with their mother and 3.3 million with their father.
About 3-in-10 living with their single father, or 1.1 million, resided in
a household that included dad's unmarried partner. In contrast, only
1-in-10 children who lived with their single mother, or 1.8 million,
shared the home with mom's unmarried partner.

   On the health insurance front, 88 percent of all children had coverage
as compared with 91 percent of those living with two parents, 86 percent
of those with single mothers and 82 percent of those with single fathers.
Only 59 percent of children in households where neither parent was present
had health insurance coverage.

Other highlights from the report and accompanying tables:

   - Children living with single mothers and those living apart from both
     parents were most likely to be in households receiving public 
     assistance (about 12 percent for each group).

   - Five percent of children living only with their father and 2 percent 
     of those living with married parents were in households receiving 
     public assistance.

   - About 5.6 million children, or 8 percent of the total, lived in a 
     household that included a grandparent. The majority of these children 
     (3.7 million) lived in the grandparent's home; of these, two-thirds 
     had a parent present.

   - Children living in a grandparent's home with neither parent present 
     were more likely to be poor (30 percent) than children living in
     their parent's home with a grandparent present (12 percent) or 
     children living in a grandparent's home with a parent present
     (15 percent).

   - Among the 11.8 million children ages 15 to 17, about 2.4 million 
     were working; and of these, 2.2 million were part-time.

   The findings are from the Annual Demographic Supplement to the March
2002 Current Population Survey, which uses Census 2000 as the base for its
sample. As in all surveys, the data are subject to sampling variability
and other sources of error.

   A related publication released last week by the Census Bureau,
Facts for Features: Father's Day, contains additional data relating
to fathers. This publication has data on fathers as child-care providers, 
and on demographic characteristics of both single fathers and fathers who 
are part of married-couple families.