Nonetheless it is an uncomfortable truth that children of divorce and children with unmarried parents tend to do much worse in life than children of two-parent families. (I*ll leave aside the sensitive issue of children of same-sex marriages, since these haven*t existed in a non-stigmatized atmosphere long enough to produce measurable results.)
As Schulz points out, that uncomfortable truth is not controversial among social scientists. It is affirmed by undoubted liberals like Harvard*s David Ellwood and Christopher Jencks.
Growing up outside a two-parent family means not just lower incomes and less social mobility, Schulz argues. It also reduces human capital * *the knowledge, education, habits, willpower * all the internal stuff that is largely intangible a person has that helps produce an income.*
While children are born with certain innate capacities, those capacities can be broadened or narrowed by their upbringing. The numbers indicate that single or divorced parents * however caring and dedicated * are unable, on average, to broaden those capacities as much as married parents can.
These differences have sharp implications for upward mobility.
Schulz points to an Economic Mobility Project analysis that shows that among children who start off in the bottom third of the income distribution, only 26 percent with divorced parents move up, compared to 42 percent born to unmarried mothers (who may marry later, of course) and 50 percent who grow up with two married parents.