Family breakdowns are at the highest level since records began – with almost half of teenagers not living with both birth parents by 14, a study has revealed.
It calculates that an astonishing 45 per cent of teens do not live with both parents – even though official figures suggest just 24 per cent of families are headed by a lone parent.
Official estimates for family breakdown have been ‘dramatically understated’ as they do not factor in parents who have new partners and those with young children who split later, researchers claim.
The study, by the Marriage Foundation think-tank, found the level of family breakdown has increased fivefold since the 1970s and has reached ‘epidemic proportions’, warning that, as the likelihood of familial collapse is intergenerational, ‘these figures will worsen in future years’.
The report also said: ‘Some level of family breakdown is inevitable. But 45 per cent? This should be a national scandal.’ Official figures from the 1970s show just 8 per cent of families were headed by one parent, but the think-tank’s analysis of data from the Millennium Cohort Study – a study of about 19,000 people born in 2000-02 – found this has dropped to just 45 per cent.
