divorce

When both husband and wife hold college degrees, it is the husband’s degree — and the husband’s degree alone — that typically determines whether a “power couple” will move to another city for career purposes, suggests a new study by economists at Washington University in St. Louis. The study is bad news for young women seeking gender equity in salary and career opportunities.

Promoting healthy marriages in African-American communities.The Bush Administration has introduced proposals to renew Temporary Assistance for Needy Families that include spending $1.5 billion over five years to create programs with the goal of promoting marriage, reducing divorce and creating incentives for fathers to be involved in their children’s lives. “Although controversial, President Bush’s plan to make marriage promotion an explicit element of the government’s anti-poverty policy sends an urgent call to African-American faith communities to increase and expand marriage promotion and building activities within their congregations,” says Stephanie Boddie, Ph.D., a noted community development expert and assistant professor in the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis. “Faith leaders in the African-American community need to be aware of the current vigorous debate about the definition, purpose, jurisdiction and future of marriage under way in the United States that is influencing federal welfare policy.”