The Economic Consequences of Unwed Motherhood: Using Twin Births as a Natural Experiment

The authors estimate the short-run and life-cycle effects of unplanned children on unwed mothers by comparing unmarried women who first gave birth to twins with unwed mothers who bore singletons. They find large short-term effects of unplanned births on labor-force participation, poverty, and welfare recipiency among unwed mothers but not among married mothers. Although most of the adverse economic effects of unplanned motherhood dissipate over time for whites, there are larger and more persistent negative effects on black unwed mothers. Copyright 1994 by American Economic Association.

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