subscribesubscriber servicescontact usabout ussite map
 
May 23, 2001

Alternative living situations gain popularity in Michigan

Living together out of wedlock, living alone, single parent households show significant gains
By JOHN FLESHER
The Associated Press
       Jennifer Galant is 25, gainfully employed and taking college courses. But when the subject of marriage comes up, she's not exactly a young woman in a hurry.
      "It would be great to get the spotlight to shine on me for one night with all my family there, but in the end it's really just a piece of paper," says the auto worker, who lives with her boyfriend in Chesaning.
      Living together out of wedlock gained popularity in Michigan during the 1990s, as did other alternatives to the married-with-children standard, according to census data released Wednesday.
      Marriage remained the most common living arrangement; 51.4 percent of the state's nearly 3.8 million households were headed by a husband and wife in 2000.
      Only 2 percent of households consisted of unmarried partners, while 12.5 percent were led by women with no husband present and 26.2 percent by adults living alone.
      Still, such alternatives had considerably higher growth rates.
      Michigan had 1.9 million households with married couples in 2000, a 3.4 percent increase over 1990. Meanwhile, the 202,220 households with unmarried partners represented a 63 percent increase. Single-resident households jumped 22.7 percent, while those led by women without husbands present rose 7.1 percent.
      The growth of alternative households is actually a return to the historical norm, says Lori Post, a demographer with the Institute for Children, Youth and Families at Michigan State University.
      She says the married-with-children model gained ascendancy in the 1950s, when the postwar economy was booming, people wedded young and women stayed home with the children.
      Previously, men and women worked side by side on farms. High mortality rates from disease and war made it common for children to grow up in single-parent households.
      "The Fifties were really a deviant time period," Post said.
      Advocates for the unmarried say the 2000 numbers show their lifestyles merit greater respect from a society that has treated marriage with children as the ideal.
      "There is strength in numbers, and the continuing increase in the number of unmarried adults in Michigan will have political and economic repercussions," said Thomas Coleman, executive director of the American Association for Single People.
      He noted that the 51.4 percent of households led by married couples was down from 55.1 percent in 1990. The proportion of married households with children under 18 dropped from 25.6 percent to 23.1 percent, falling below the percentage of households with adults living alone.
      The average household size in Michigan fell from 2.66 people to 2.56 over the decade, while the average family size went from 3.16 to 3.10.
      The relative decrease in married-with-children households isn't solely a result of evolving social standards, said Warren Brown, senior research associate at Cornell University.