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At What Cost A Room of Her Own? Factors Contributing to the Feminization of Poverty Among Prime-Age Women, 1939–1959

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2009

Linda Barrington  and
Cecilia A. Conrad
Linda Barrington
Affiliation:
Assistant Professors of Economics at Barnard College, Columbia University, 3009 Broadway, New York, NY 10027
Cecilia A. Conrad
Affiliation:
Assistant Professors of Economics at Barnard College, Columbia University, 3009 Broadway, New York, NY 10027
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Abstract

This article investigates the feminization of poverty prior to 1960 by focusing on three factors that contributed to the increase in the propensity to form female-headed households and to the poverty rate among such households. Compared with 1939, households headed by prime-age women in 1959 included fewer adults, thereby reducing earnings potential. The earnings level at which such women formed independent households was lower relative to the poverty line; and although higher earnings allowed more women to form independent households, the increase was not large enough to lift some of these households out of poverty.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 54 , Issue 2 , June 1994 , pp. 342 - 357
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1994

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References

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