Single Mothers And Single Fathers example essay topic

Family or Finance, Which Should Come First? When looking at custody cases in America today, one must wonder what the courts find more important when deciding the fate of these children, family or finance? The issue has been raised that the majority of the time, the mother gets custody of the children. Should this be so?

Should we at this time, a time where we are trying to break through the molds of the mother being the only caregiver, automatically assume that the mother should gain custody of the children? Or, should we begin to look at the merits of allowing fathers to gain custody of the children? When looking at these cases, cases where both the mother and father desire custody of the children, how do you decide who should win? Should money be the primary factor? Should family be the primary factor? Or should the kids' desires be the primary factor?

All these question have been raised, and the courts answer is very simple. When deciding who should gain custody of the children the primary factor is "What is in the best interest of the child?" The problem to this answer is that it is too vague and doesn't effectively answer any of the questions above. So lets look at what the courts feel is in the best interest of the children. Based on statistics from 1994, single mothers made up 6.6% of all families, while single fathers made up only 1.2%. So it would appear that mothers are more likely to end up with the children than fathers.

Of course we must take into consideration the fact that not all the fathers want the children, and they go to the mother by default, and then there are the fathers that are in prison. There are also cases of the women not wanting the children as well. But we do not want to focus on these people, we are looking strictly at cases where both parents desire custody of the children. The fact is there are more single mothers than fathers, and when it comes to cases where both parents want the child, the mothers are more likely to win custody than the father.

So we must determine why this is. When looking at recent statistics you can see that 52% of single mothers are below the poverty level, where only a little over 20% of single fathers fall below the level. This means that more than half of the mothers that gain custody of their children are poor and need government aid. Is this what the courts feels is in the best interest of the children? There are several reasons so many of these single mothers are poor. First, women on average get paid less than men do.

It has been proven that the gender gap is alive and well, and because of it the women in our work force typically work for less than the men do. In class it was speculated that the reason women get paid less, is that they are willing to work for less. Men have a certain limit that they are willing to work for, and they wont work for anything below that limit. While women are more likely to take the lower paying job because they need the money no matter how little it is. Another reason that single mothers are making less, is they are working at lower paying part time jobs.

They will not work as many hours as single fathers and because of this, they work at part time jobs doing office work, or flipping burgers. One of the reasons that single mothers don't work as much as single fathers, is that since they get paid less they can't afford childcare. Another cause for this wage gap, is education. In 1993 the majority of single mothers receiving AFDC had not graduated from high school. While almost 80% of single mothers not receiving AFDC had at least graduated from high school. Of course there is the issue of child support and welfare to help these mothers out.

Maybe with these factors the mothers will be ok right, well the answer is wrong. The fact is that the United States welfare program is not very effective at helping out single mothers. The current welfare programs only pulled one in nine single mothers out of poverty. And while these mothers are receiving welfare, they are only allowed to accept $50 in child support a month and must give the government the rest.

So in fact the government aide and child support may be of some assistance, but it isn't enough to help these mothers out. So after looking at these figures, we can see that money must not be the primary factor in deciding custody cases. So what does decide the custody cases. Some people say the children should have the right to choose. I personally agree with this to an extent. I believe that the children if they are of an age where they can understand their decision, and understand the results of their decision, then these children should be allowed to make the choice.

But at the same time, we must be reasonable about this. A two year old child is not going to be able to make the decision on which parent would be best for her. So there would have to be a certain maturity level necessary to allow the kids opinion to count. Thankfully, the courts feel the same way. Some courts, not all, do allow the children's testimony to be heard, and will allow that testimony to help decide the case if the child meets this maturity level. So finance doesn't decide who receives custody, and the children don't usually get to decide, what's left?

Well we haven't talked about family yet. While doing some research it came to my attention, that yes as one would hope, family does play a very serious role in determining who receives the custody of the child. The courts do require certain psychological tests to be done on the parents to help determine who is going to be best for these kids. After the tests certain factors are looked at to help decide the case. Some of these factors include drinking and drug abuse, likeliness to abuse or neglect the children, and health conditions of the parents. Obviously if it is discovered that one of the parents is a drug user or has an alcohol problem then that parent will not be given custody of the child.

At the same time if there are reasons to believe that one parent will neglect the children, or has a history of abuse then that parent will also not get the child. The last thing mentioned was health conditions, if one parent has serious medical conditions that may affect their ability to care for or support the child. Then it is determined that the children's best interest would not be served by placing them with that parent. So it would appear that family is the most important factor in deciding who gains custody cases.

I personally agree with this, and feel that family is more important than money. I believe it is in the best interest of the child to be well cared for, and this doesn't just mean financially. There is a lot more to raising children than money. Based on this belief I feel that the government needs to step up its welfare programs to seriously help both single mothers and single fathers. If the governments welfare program was what it should be, then we wouldn't need to consider money as an issue in custody cases. We would be able to support single parent families despite which parent received custody.

By doing this, we could then focus on the family aspect of the debate, and worry about which parent will care for the children. I feel it is in the best interest of the child to not have to worry about finances. They should just have to worry about being cared for. Children shouldn't have to suffer for the mistakes of their parents, and society should insure that all children are well cared for.