ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, December 5, 1996 TAG: 9612050036
SECTION: NATL/INTL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: The Washington Post
Nearly 3.7 million American households are made up of unmarried couples, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Wednesday, underscoring the widespread acceptance of a living arrangement shunned by society a generation ago.
That number has increased dramatically, climbing 85 percent over the past decade and increasing sevenfold since 1970. While there was just 1 ``cohabiting'' couple for every 100 married-couple households in 1970, by last year the ratio had increased to 6 unmarried couples for every 100 married households.
The annual study also reported on another aspect of modern life, the increase in the number of children being raised in the homes of their grandparents. The study found that 6 percent of all children lived in their grandparents' homes in 1995. That compares with 3 percent in 1970.
Of those living with grandparents last year, 37 percent did not have a parent in the household. That figure has also increased, up from 30 percent in 1990, reflecting the greater likelihood that grandparents are taking the place of absent parents.
The tendency for young people today to delay marriage, combined with high divorce rates, means that Americans spend more of their years unmarried and therefore have more ``opportunity'' to live with their romantic partners, said Census Bureau demographer Arlene Saluter, who wrote the report.
``It's just the increased opportunity to have this type of living arrangement and the growing acceptance of American society,'' she said.
Many demographers argue that ``cohabitation,'' as they call it, has become a common stage of life, as young people leave their parents' homes, form relationships and set up their own households, and should be recognized in many cases as the first phase of marriage.
Studies have shown that, while only about 4 percent of all households are made up of unmarried couples at any point, as many as one-sixth of those 19 and older say they lived with an unmarried partner at some time in their lives. Some studies have put that figure at one-quarter.
The numbers do not include gay or lesbian partners living together. The 1990 census estimated that 145,000 households were made up of same-sex domestic partners.
University of Wisconsin demographer Larry Bumpass found that cohabitation is more likely among high-school dropouts, those whose parents received welfare and those not raised in an intact family.
``Nonetheless, cohabitation before marriage has become common throughout society,'' he wrote, saying that more than a quarter of college graduates have lived with a partner before marriage.
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