![]() The higher the ratio, the larger the gap between low-income and middle-income households. But a key factor is the measure of income inequality-the ratio of income at the 10th and 50th percentiles for the state. Kearney and Levine use econometric modeling techniques that consider other factors affecting teenage birth rates such as age, race/ethnicity, and state-level characteristics such as unemployment rate, religiosity, poverty, racial/ethnic makeup, and welfare policies. ![]() Washington, D.C., tends to have a high level of income inequality, while a low level of income inequality can characterize relatively impoverished states (such as Arizona) or those better off (such as New Hampshire). Income inequality is also persistent in its geographic variation. 4 These variations have remained remarkably persistent over the past two decades. In 2005, the teenage birth rate in Mississippi was 61 per 1,000 women ages 15 to 19, while in New Hampshire the rate was 18. For example, young girls in Mississippi have children three times more often than those in New Hampshire. To test the “culture of despair” hypothesis, the researchers make use of substantial, persistent geographic variation in both teenage birth rates and state-level income inequality. Analytically, they focus on unmarried women who were pregnant before age 20. Kearney and Levine draw on data from the National Survey of Family Growth, representing over 42,000 women between the ages of 15 and 44 they used data from seven of the years between 19. ![]() On teenage childbearing, Kearny and Levine argue that “when a poor young woman perceives that socioeconomic success is not achievable to her, she is more likely to embrace motherhood in her current position … When there is relatively more hope of economic advancement, it is relatively more desirable to delay motherhood and invest in human or social capital.” 3 In such places, hopelessness generates despair. Wilson argues that specific places become characterized by persistent poverty because of lack of opportunity, social isolation, and exclusion from the job network. 2 Their hypothesis follows the classic work of sociologist William Julius Wilson, The Truly Disadvantaged (1987). “A culture of despair” is the argument put forward by researchers Melissa Kearney and Phillip Levine, with the University of Maryland Population Research Center and Wellesley College respectively. Recent analyses of data from the National Survey of Family Growth suggest that teenage girls of lower socioeconomic status, in regions of high income inequality, are far more likely to “keep their baby.” Teenagers of higher socioeconomic status-with college-educated mothers-and in regions with less income inequality have lower birth rates. New analyses published by the National Bureau of Economic Research suggest that part of the explanation for high fertility among American teens may be related to surrounding income inequality-the local gap between “haves” and “have nots.” In the United States, girls are more than twice as likely as their Canadian peers to have a child (14.2), and nearly six times as likely as Swedish teens (5.9). And these rates are dramatically higher than in other developed countries.
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