Single parenthood has always existed but it no longer arises from the same causes:the suffered situation of widowhood has been replaced by a decision chosen by one or both of the spouses. This was particularly flagrant in the years after 1968, when in just a few years the number of single-parent families doubled. INSEE is obliged to take an interest in this and defines them as a family which "includes a single parent and one or more single children (without children)" .
It is always difficult to obtain recent figures because studies are not done every year, but in 2008, one in five families was a single parent, i.e. approximately 20% of families:1.76 million families. In 40 years, the figure has been multiplied by 2.5! 85% of single parents are women and 15% are men.
At the economic level, these female heads of single-parent families are more affected by poverty or its risks:30% of single-parent families live below the poverty line (€949 per month) against 13% for the population as a whole (figures of 2008). They are less educated than those living in a couple (23% have a higher education diploma, compared to 30%) and their activity rate is also slightly lower (68%) than that of mothers of families in a couple (72% ), but they still have to work full time, which is less often the case (one time out of two, they do not work full time), mainly because of childcare problems. In fact, INSEE studies show that when children are over 10 years old, job insecurity mirrors the situations of women in couples.
To find housing, single-parent families face real problems because they very often lack the means:28% of single-parent mothers own their home, compared to 63% of couples with children. And 20% live in a dwelling where one or two rooms are missing. In urban areas, 24% of families with children are single parents, compared to 16% in rural areas.
The composition of single-parent families varies, but we see that many couples break up after the arrival of the first child:56% of single-parent families are made up of only one adult and one child, and only 14% have three or more children. .
17.7% of children under 25 live in a single-parent family. Since the vast majority of children live with their mother after a divorce, in total, for 18% of children (aged 0 to 34) of separated parents, the father says he never sees them. If the father recreates a family, the frequency of relationships becomes even less frequent. The lower his income, the less he sees his children. On the other hand, the rupture of the father-child bond is rarer after an alternating residence.
Single-parent families are a true category of families, in the same way as homoparental families, for example; in the same way, this new form of parenthood must evolve and advance the legal and societal aspects of our policies.
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