By one estimate, 80 percent of grandparent-headed households are the result of drug or alcohol abuse involving the parents. Parental incarceration, mental or physical illness, family violence, poverty, death and teenage motherhood also contribute to the problem. The grandfamily boom is also related to the incredible growth in single-parent families. If something happens to one parent, there's no second one to take over, says Susan Conwell, a Harvard-trained attorney who runs Kids Matter Inc., a local nonprofit that counsels grandparents. Nationally, one-third of all children are now born to single women, but the rate is 60 percent in Milwaukee. The city's second-place ranking nationally for teen births helps drive this statistic. Grandparents raising children have become so common they're now enshrined in popular culture. Three of the Sunday comics -- "Grand Avenue," "Boondocks" and "Pickles" -- feature kids who are or have been raised by grandparents. Radio shows like "Sound Money" debate whether grandparents should adopt their grandchildren.
Yet the country hasn't begun to catch up to the problem or provide overburdened grandparents with resources or recognition. "Society gives them so little support," says former Milwaukee County Children's Court Chief Judge Christopher Foley. "It's really an abdication of responsibility." The stories of some of these grandparents suggest the unique challenges these new families face.
More than six million children -- approximately 1 in 12 -- are living in households headed by grandparents (4.5 million children) or other relatives (1.5 million children). U.S. Census 2000 data tell us that 2.4 million grandparents are taking on primary responsibility for their grandchildren's basic needs. Many of these grandparents have assumed this responsibility without the parent of the child being in the home.
AARP assembled state-by-state "fact sheets" to help grandparents raising grandchildren learn more about what help is available to them (scroll down the page to access the fact sheets). The National Center for Grandparents Raising Grandchildren at Georgia State University said:
According to the 2000 U.S. Census Bureau, of the 5,771,671 grandparents reported living in households with one or more own grandchildren under 18 years, 2,426,730 of these grandparents are responsible for the children, an alarming 42 percent.
Children living in grandparent-headed households:
13.2 percent of all African-American children 10.6 percent of all Native American and Pacific Islander children 7.8 percent of all Hispanic children 4.2 percent of all Caucasian children
Top 10 states with number of children living in grandparent-headed households -- U.S. Census 2000: California (625,934); Texas (448,439); New York (297,239); Florida (258,952); Illinois (213,465); Georgia (164,423); Pennsylvania (164,354); Ohio (157,298); Michigan (143,523); and North Carolina (135,158).
For many of these families, living is hard. Here is a state-by-state breakdown, from the National Center for Grandparents Raising Grandchildren:
More companies are enrolling in commuter tax benefit programs, signing up for employee discounts with local mass transit, and hiking their transportation subsidies. Advantages include tax breaks and retaining employees; the same survey said 12 percent of commuters have considered switching jobs simply to shorten their commute. "We realized that to be competitive with other companies, and to help people with the rising cost of gas, we'd want to make sure we were giving an amount that was making an impact with the employee," said Ruth Cummings, who developed [the Regence Group's] commute reimbursement program.
Easing the cost of commuting is getting more popular these days, according to Larry Filler, founder and president of TransitCenter.
Filler started the TransitChek program in the New York area in 1987 to let commuters pay for mass transit, and now parking, with cash from their salaries before taxes are taken out -- which, depending on their tax bracket, can translate to savings of some $200 to $500 a year. The benefit to the company is that it doesn't have to pay Social Security payroll taxes for those employees. Since then, the program has expanded around the country, from a dozen companies to 11,000 and other similar packages have popped up around the country. The IRS has gradually boosted the tax-free amount an employee can get from $15 to $105 monthly. And later this year, TransitChek is coming out with a new card to meet the needs of workers whose commutes require more than one type of transportation.
TiVo-Proof Mini-Commercials
Hail, the five-second TV ad. Buyers are trying to grab some of the DVR/TiVo audience that skips through the ads. USA Today reports.
Smaller than a sports bag and often more stylish to boot, the manbag is becoming a must-have item for all UK gadget fans keen to stow their multiple devices. And while 4 percent of men surveyed for a piece of research from business communications company Damovo still go for the 'batman' utility belt approach of clipping their gadgets around their waist, it seems that stereotypical image of the gadget fan at large is being killed off by the manbag. A third of respondents (32 percent) still manage to get their techie toys into a pocket but by far the most popular option is putting all the gadgets into a bag.
