Economic Impact on Single parent families.

Single parent families deal with many day to day issues. Most of these issues are those that the dominant nuclear family does not have to face. I wanted to find out what these issues are and discovered that there are many potential problem areas and pressures. 

The American Psychological Association states that these problems are:

- Visitation and custody problems.
- The effects of continuing conflict between the parents.
- Less opportunity for children and parents to spend time together.
- Effects of the breakup on children's school performance.

                                                                           (American Psychological Association, n.d.)

Society puts enormous pressure on mothers to provide a "good father figure" and twice as much pressure if you are raising a boy. (Levy, 2013).

These effects can have a huge impact and can lead to socio-economic problems. Link (2009) writes that "According to Weitoft, Hiem, Haglund and Rosen (2003) the socio-economic situation of children in families with only one adult was different from that of children in families with two adults. More single parents than couples were unskilled manual workers, low-grade non-manual workers, and people without an occupation, whereas couples were more likely than single parents to be high-grade or medium-grade non-manual workers (p. 291). From this information it shows that with the type of occupation and skills, a low pay rate would come with it. This means it would be difficuilt to pay for things and can lead to poverty. 

Economic impact has a large effect on single parent families. It is not easy surviving off a single income and supporting a child. Colin (2000) writes that "the economic impact is huge. It's a lose, lose, lose, lose..." that "family breakdown is a near direct path to poverty for women and children". Colin (2000) also follows that single mothers who could not fall back on their families received less assistance from government and were stigmatized to a far greater extent for being poor.

Laasko (2004) cited in Colin (2000) states that in terms of custodial and noncustodial parental responsibilities, financial contributions have often been seen as a key factor in explaining both mothers’ and fathers’ behaviours and the frequency of visits with their children (p.3). This shows that income plays a big role in single parents responsibilities and effects not only the parents but the impact it has on the child and the support given to raise the child. In most situations it is the mother that has custody of the child and the father having to pay child support. This conversation between parents leads to effects of continuing conflict between the parents. This has an impact on the child.

There are many ways that parents can co-operate to make things easier on each other. I found very helpful information through this website. 

http://www.helpguide.org/mental/coparenting_shared_parenting_divorce.htm

So what does this mean for single parent families?

In today's economy in regards to the recession, it is very hard to find part time work that is respectable and put your child in to care.  Most single parents think that the easier option is to resort to the government and go on the benefit.  The New Zealand benefit is called 'the domestic purposes benefit'. Cited in Work and Income (n.d.) the current amount that sole parents can receive on the benefit as of 1, April, 2013 is:

Category	Net	Gross
Sole parent	$295.37	$335.18
Hospital rate	$42.64	$47.64

Looking at the price range that is available on the DPB, it makes me wonder how hard it must be to keep up with day to day bills such as rent, power, food, petrol. These bills are not exactly on the cheap side, and it must be very hard for single parents to cope and not head down the road to poverty. 

I looked in to what legislations the government had in regards to helping this group of people, and I found that: There are current changes being made with the government and legislation is passing through. Paula Bennett, Minister of social development has welcomed the passing of the social security amendment bill into law 'Benefit Categories and Work Focus' (Bennett, 2013). These changes are:

- Job seeker support for people actively seeking work.
- Support for sole parents with children under 14 years of age.
- Supported living payment for people significantly restricted by sickness, injury or disability. 

Bennett (2013) states that “The legislation also introduces new social obligations to ensure children in benefit-dependent homes get quality Early Childhood Education, are enrolled with a doctor, get their Well Child checks and are in school if they are school-age. This will be a huge help to single parent families in regards to putting their child in an early childhood practice to gain education and the best start to their life.