text:
Marriage, Poverty, and Public Policy
A Discussion Paper from the Council on Contemporary Families
Prepared for the Fifth Annual CCF Conference, April 26-28, 2002
by Stephanie Coontz and Nancy Folbre
One of the stated objectives of welfare legislation
passed in 1996 was "to end dependence by promoting marriage." With this
legislation coming up for re-authorization, many policy-makers want to devote
more public resources to this goal, even if it requires cutting spending on cash
benefits, child care, or job training. Some states, such as West Virginia,
already use their funds to provide a special bonus to couples on public
assistance who get married.(1) In December 2001, more
than fifty state
legislators asked Congress to divert funds from existing programs into marriage
education and incentive policies, earmarking dollars to encourage welfare
recipients to marry and giving bonus money to states that increase marriage
rates. On February 26, 2002, President Bush called for spending up to $300
million a year to promote marriage among poor people. href="#2">(2)
Such proposals reflect the widespread assumption that failure to marry, rather
than unemployment, poor education, and lack of affordable child care, is the
primary cause of child poverty. Voices from both sides of the political spectrum
urge us to get more women to the altar. Journalist Jonathan Rauch argues that
"marriage is displacing both income and race as the great class divide of the new
century."(3) Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation
claims that "the sole
reason that welfare exists is the collapse of marriage." href="#4">(4) In this briefing
paper, we question both this explanation of poverty and the policy prescriptions
that derive from it.
Marriage offers important social and economic benefits. Children who grow up
with married parents generally enjoy a higher standard of living than those
living in single-parent households. Two parents are usually better than one not
only because they can bring home two paychecks, but also because they can share
responsibilities for child care. Marriage often leads to higher levels of
paternal involvement than divorce, non-marriage, or cohabitation. Long-term
commitments to provide love and support to one another are beneficial for adults,
as well as children.
Public policies toward marriage could and should be improved.
href="#5">(5) Taxes or
benefit reductions that impose a marriage penalty on low-income couples are
inappropriate and should be eliminated. Well designed public policies could play
a constructive role in helping couples develop the skills they need to develop
healthy and sustainable relationships with each other and their children. It does
not follow, however, that marriage promotion should be a significant component of
anti-poverty policy, or that public policies should provide a "bonus" to couples
who marry.
The current pro-marriage agenda in anti-poverty policy is misguided for at
least four reasons:
the other way around.
without helping them solve problems that make relationships precarious could
leave them worse off.
children at risk. More than one third of all impoverished young children in the
U.S. today live with two parents.
Single parenthood does not inevitably lead to poverty. In countries with a more
adequate social safety net than the United States, single parent families are
much less likely to live in poverty. Even within the United States, single
mothers with high levels of education fare relatively well.
In this briefing paper, we summarize recent empirical evidence concerning the
relationship between marriage and poverty, and develop the four points above in
more detail. We also emphasize the need to develop a larger anti-poverty program
that provides the jobs, education, and child care that poor families need in
order to move toward self-sufficiency.
The Economic Context
Children living with married parents generally fare better than others in
terms of family income. In 2000, 6 percent of married couple families with
children lived in poverty, compared to 33 percent of female householders with
children.(6) Mothers who never marry are more
vulnerable to poverty than
virtually any other group, including those who have been divorced. href="#7">(7)
But the low income associated with single parenthood reflects many
interrelated factors. Income is distributed far more unequally in the United
States than in most other developed countries, making it difficult for low-wage
workers (male or female) to support a family without a second income. Women who
become single mothers are especially likely to have inadequate wages, both
because of pre-existing disadvantages such as low educational attainment and work
experience and because the shortage of publicly subsidized child care makes it
difficult for them to work full time. In 2000, only 1.2 percent of children of
single mothers with a college degree who worked full-time year round lived in
poverty.(8) For single mothers with some college
working full-time, the poverty rate was less than 8 percent. href="#9">(9)
Whether single or married, working parents face high child care costs that are
seldom factored into calculations of poverty and income. Consider the situation
of a single mother with two children working full-time, full year round at the
minimum wage of $5.15 an hour, for an income of $10,712. If she files for and
receives the maximum Earned Income Tax Credit, she can receive as much as $3,816
in public assistance. But the EITC phases out quickly if she earns much more than
the minimum wage, and her child care costs are very high. Unless she is lucky
enough to have a family member who can provide free child care, or to find a
federally subsidized child care slot, more than 20 per cent of her income will
go to pay for child care.(10) Federally subsidized
child care remains quite
limited. Most families who made a transition from welfare to employment in the
1990s did not receive a subsidy.(11)
The high cost of child care helps explain why the economic position of single
parents has improved little in recent years despite significant increases in
their hours of market work.(12) It may also explain
why single parents are
likely to live in households with other adults who can share expenses with them.
About 40 percent of births to single mothers take place among cohabitors, and
much of the increase in nonmarital childbearing in recent years reflects this
trend rather than an increase in among women living without a partner. href="#13">(13) The
economic stress associated with reductions in welfare benefits over the past six
years may have increased the pressure on single mothers to cohabit, often with
partners who are unwilling or unlikely to marry.(14)
On both a symbolic and a practical level, marriage facilitates the income
pooling and task sharing that allows parents to accommodate family needs. href="#15">(15)
Not surprisingly, many low-income families consider marriage the ideal
arrangement for child rearing.(16) The Fragile
Families and Child Welfare project
currently underway in about twenty cities shows that about 50 per cent of
unmarried parents of newborns live together and hope to marry at some
Lower expectations among some couples were associated not with disinterest in
marriage but with reports of drug or alcohol problems, physical violence,
conflict and mistrust.(18)
The advantages of marriage, however, do not derive simply from having two
names on a marriage certificate, and they cannot be acquired merely by going
through a formality. Rather, they grow out of a long-term and economically
sustainable commitment that many people feel is beyond their reach.
Causality Works Both Ways
Liking the abstract idea of marriage and being able to put together a stable
marriage in real life are two very different things. Unemployment, low wages, and
poverty discourage family formation and erode family stability, making it less
likely that individuals will marry in the first place and more likely that their
marriages will deteriorate. These economic factors have long-term as well as
short-term effects, contributing to changes in social norms regarding marriage
and family formation and exacerbating distrust between men and women. These
long-term effects help explain why African-Americans marry at much lower rates
than other groups within the U.S. population. Poverty is a cause as well as a
consequence of non-marriage and of marital disruption. href="#19">(19)
Dan Lichter of Ohio State University puts it this way: "Marriage can be a
pathway from poverty, but only if women are 'marriageable,' stay married, and
marry well."(20) Precisely because marriage offers
economic advantages,
individuals tend to seek potential spouses who have good earnings potential and
to avoid marriage when they do not feel they or their potential mates can
comfortably support a family. Ethnographic research shows that low-income women
see economic stability on the part of a prospective partner as a necessary
precondition for marriage.(21) Not surprisingly, men
increasingly use the same
calculus. Rather than looking for someone they can "rescue" from poverty,
employed men are much more likely to marry women who themselves have good
employment prospects.(22)
Poor mothers who lack a high school degree and any regular employment history
are not likely to fare very well in the so-called "marriage market." Teenage
girls who live in areas of high unemployment and inferior schools are five to
seven times more likely to become unwed parents than more fortunately situated
teens.(23) A study of the National Longitudinal
Survey of Youth confirms that
poor women, whatever their age, and regardless of whether or not they are or have
ever been on welfare, are less likely to marry than women who are not poor.
Among poor women, those who do not have jobs are less likely to marry than those
who do.(24)
It is easy to spin a hypothetical scenario in which marrying off single
mothers to an average male would raise family incomes and reduce poverty. But
unmarried males, and especially unmarried males in impoverished neighborhoods,
are not average. That is often the reason they are not married. Researchers from
the Center for Research on Child Well-Being at Princeton University report
results from the Fragile Families Survey showing that unmarried fathers were
twice as likely as married ones to have a physical or psychological problem that
interfered with their ability to find or keep a job, and several times more
likely to abuse drugs or alcohol. More than 25 percent of unmarried fathers were
not employed when their child was born, compared to fewer than 10 percent of
married fathers.(25)
Poor mothers tend to live in neighborhoods in which their potential marriage
partners are also likely to be poorly educated and irregularly employed.
Low-earning men are less likely to get married and more likely to divorce than
men with higher earnings.(26) Over the past thirty
years, labor market
opportunities for men with low levels of education have declined
substantially.(27) Several studies suggest that the
decrease in real wages for
low-income men during the 1980s and early 1990s contributed significantly to
lower marriage rates in those years.(28)
This trend has been exacerbated by the high incarceration rates for men
convicted of non-violent crimes, such as drug use. While in jail, these men are
not available for women to marry and their diminished job prospects after release
permanently impair their marriageability. High rates of incarceration among
black males, combined with high rates of mortality, have led to a decidedly
tilted sex ratio within the African-American population, and a resulting scarcity
of marriageable men.(29) One study of the marriage
market in the 1980s found that
at age 25 there were three unmarried black women for every black man who had
adequate earnings.(30) As Ron Mincy of Columbia
University emphasizes, simple
pro-marriage policies are likely to offer less benefit to African-Americans
families than policies encouraging responsible fatherhood and paternal
In short, the notion that we could end child poverty by marrying off
impoverished women does not take into account the realities of life among the
population most likely to be poor. It is based on abstract scenarios that ignore
the many ways in which poverty diminishes people's ability to build and sustain
stable family relationships.
Quality Matters
Happy, healthy, stable marriages offer important benefits to adults and
children. But not all marriages fit this description. Marital distress leads to
harsh and inconsistent parenting, whether or not parents stay together. Studies
show that a marriage marked by conflict, jealousy and anger is often worse for
children's well-being than divorce or residence from birth in a stable
single-parent family.(32) For instance, research
shows that while children born
to teenagers who were already married do better than children born to
never-married teens, children born to teen parents who married after the
birth do worse on some measures, probably because of the high conflict that
accompanies marriages entered into with ambivalence or under pressure. Some
research suggests that, among low-income African-American families, children from
single-parent homes show higher educational achievement than their counterparts
from two-parent homes.(33)
The idea that marriage can solve the problems of children in impoverished
families ignores the complex realities of these families. The Fragile Families
study shows that many low-income parents of new born children already have
children from previous relationships. Thus, their marriages would not create
idealized biological families, but rather blended families in which child support
enforcement and negotiation among stepparents would complicate
relationships.(34) A recent study of families in
poor neighborhoods in Boston, Chicago and San
Antonio also reveals complex patterns of cohabitation and coparenting. href="#35">(35)
Marriage to a stepfather may improve a mother's economic situation, but it
does not necessarily improve outcomes for children and in some cases leads to
more problems than continued residence in a stable single-parent family. Even if
programs succeed in getting first-time parents married, there is no guarantee
that the couples will stay married. Research shows that marriages contracted in
the 1960s in order to "legitimate" a child were highly likely to end in
divorce.(36) Multiple transitions in and out of
marriage are worse for children
psychologically than residence in the same kind of family, whatever its form,
over long periods of time.(37)
Women and children in economically precarious situations are particularly
vulnerable to domestic violence.(38) While it may be
true that cohabiting
couples are more prone to violence than married couples, this is probably because
of what social scientists call a "selection effect": People in non-abusive
relationships are more likely to get married. Encouraging women in an unstable
cohabiting relationship to marry their partners would not necessarily protect
them or their children. Indeed, the first serious violent episode in an unstable
relationship sometimes occurs only after the couple has made a formal
Even when it does not take a violent form, bad fathering can be worse than no
fathering. For instance, the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at
Columbia University found that while teens in two-parent families are, on
average, much less likely to abuse drugs or alcohol than teens in one-parent
ones, teens in two-parent families who have a poor to fair relationship with
their father are more likely to do so than teens in the average one-parent
Furthermore, even good marriages are vulnerable to dissolution. The current
risks of a marriage ending in divorce are quite high, although they have come
down from their peak in 1979-81. It is now estimated that approximately 40
percent of marriages will end in divorce, and the risk of divorce is elevated
among people with low income and insecure jobs. Sociologist Scott South
calculates that every time the unemployment rate rises by 1 percent,
approximately 10,000 extra divorces occur.(41)
Comparing the income of
single-parent families and married-couple families in any particular year leads
to an overly optimistic assessment of the benefits of marriage, because it
ignores the possibility of marital dissolution.
Marriage may provide a temporary improvement in a woman's economic prospects
without conferring any secure, long-term protection for her children. Indeed, if
marriage encourages mothers to withdraw time from paid employment, this can lower
their future earnings and increase the wage penalty that they incur from
motherhood itself.(42)
Two Parent Families Are Also Under Stress
Poverty among children is not confined to single-parent families. In 2000,
about 38% of all poor young children lived in two-parent homes. href="#43">(43) These
families have been largely overlooked in the debates over anti-poverty programs
and marriage. Indeed, the campaign to increase marriage has overlooked one of the
most important public policy issues facing the United States: the growing
economic gap between parents, whether married or unmarried, and non-parents.
The costs of raising children have increased in recent years, partly because
of the expansion of opportunities for women in the labor market and partly
because of the longer time children spend in school. The lack of public support
for parenting has also contributed to a worsening of the economic position of
parents relative to non-parents.(44) Unlike other
advanced industrial countries,
the United States fails to provide paid family leaves for parents, and levels of
publicly subsidized support for child care remain comparatively low. Most
employment practices penalize workers who take time away from paid
responsibilities to provide family care.(45) The
high cost of parenting in this
country helps explain many of the economic disadvantages that women face relative
to men.(46) It may also help explain why many men
are reluctant to embrace
paternal responsibilities.
The Need for a Better Social Safety Net
The association of single parenthood with poverty is not inevitable. In Canada
and France, single mothers -- and children in general -- are far less likely to
live in poverty. Sweden and Denmark, with higher rates of out-of-wedlock births,
have much lower rates of child poverty and hunger than does the United States.
The reason for the difference is simple: These countries devote a greater
percentage of their resources to assisting families with children than we
Similarly, dramatic differences in child poverty rates within our country
reflect differences in tax, child care, and income assistance policies across
Fans of the 1996 welfare reform law point to a dramatic decline in the welfare
rolls since its enactment. Much of this decline is attributable to the economic
boom and resulting low unemployment rates of the late 1990s. Despite promises
that work requirements and time limits would lead to a more generous package of
assistance for those who "followed the rules, " cash benefits have declined.
Between 1994 and 1999, the real value of maximum benefits fell in most states,
with an overall decline in inflation-adjusted value of about 11 per cent. href="#49">(49)
Average benefits declined even more, as recipients increased their earnings.
Indeed, the declining value of benefits is another reason why caseloads have
Punitive attitudes, as well as time limits, have discouraged many eligible
families from applying for assistance. The Census Bureau estimates that less than
30 per cent of children in poverty resided in a family that received cash public
assistance in 1998.(51) Take-up rates for Food
Stamps and Medicaid have declined
in recent years.(52) The implementation of the new
Children's Health Insurance
program has been quite uneven. As a result, states have saved money, but many
children have gone without the food or medical care they needed. Public support
for child care increased on both the federal and the state level. Still, most
families who made a transition from welfare to work in the late 1990s did not
receive a subsidy.(53)
During the economic boom of the late 1990s, increases in earnings among single
parents helped make up for declining welfare benefits. As a result, poverty rates
among children declined from a high of about 21 per cent in 1996 to about 16 per
cent in 2000.(54) But these figures do not take into
account the costs of child
care and other work-related expenses, and they offer little hope for the future
of children in low-income families as unemployment rates once again begin to
The most important federal policy promoting the welfare of low income families
is currently the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), a fully refundable tax credit
aimed at low-income families with children. Because benefits are closely tied to
earnings, and phase out steeply after family income reaches $12,460, the EITC
imposes a significant penalty on two-earner married couples, who are less likely
to benefit from it than either single parent families or married couples with a
spouse at home. This penalty is unfair and should be eliminated.
Other problems with the EITC, however, should be addressed at the same time.
Families with two children receive the maximum benefit, which means that
low-income families with three or more children do not receive any additional
assistance. More than a third of all children in the country live in families
with three or more children. Partly as a result of limited EITC coverage, these
families are prone to significantly higher poverty rates. href="#56">(56) Furthermore, the
EITC is phased out in ways that penalize middle income families, who currently
enjoy less public support for child rearing than the affluent. href="#57">(57) An expanded
unified tax credit for families with children could address this problem. href="#58">(58)
Given the pressing need for improvements in basic social safety net programs
and the threat of rising unemployment, it is unconscionable to reallocate already
inadequate Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) funds to policies
designed to promote marriage or provide a "marriage bonus." There is little
evidence that such policies would in fact increase marriage rates or reduce
poverty among children. Indeed, the main effect of marriage bonuses would
probably be to impose a "non-marriage" penalty that would have a particularly
negative impact on African-American children, who are significantly less likely
to live with married parents than either whites or Hispanics. href="#59">(59) As Julianne
Malveaux points out in her discussion of the Bush proposal, "a mere $100 million
can be considered chump change. But the chump who could have been changed is the
unemployed worker who misses out on job training because some folks find those
programs -- but not marriage-promotion programs -- a waste." href="#60">(60)
Well-designed programs to help individuals develop and improve family
relationships may be a good idea. However, they should not be targeted to the
poor, but integrated into a larger provision of public health services, or built
into existing health insurance programs (mandating, for instance, that both
public and private health insurance cover family counseling). Such programs also
should not be limited to couples who are married or planning to marry. Fathers
and step-fathers who are not living with their biological children also need
guidance and encouragement to develop healthy, nurturing relationships. Gay and
lesbian families -- who are currently legally prohibited from marriage -- also
merit assistance.
Public policies should not penalize marriage. Neither should they provide an
economic bonus or financial incentive to individuals to marry, especially at the
cost of lowering the resources available to children living with single mothers.
Such a diversion of resources from public assistance programs penalizes the
children of unmarried parents without guaranteeing good outcomes for the children
of people who are married. A variety of public policies could help strengthen
families and reduce poverty among all children, including a broadening of the
Earned Income Tax Credit, expansion of publicly subsidized child care, efforts to
promote responsible fatherhood, improvements in public education and job
training, and efforts to reduce income inequality and pay discrimination. Unlike
some of the pro-marriage policies now under consideration, these policies would
benefit couples who wish to marry but would not pressure women to enter or remain
in intimate relationships they would not otherwise choose.
Acknowledgment: The authors would like to acknowledge the assistance of
Sherman, senior research associate at the Children's Defense Fund, with
statistical references and calculations.
1. Alexandra Starr, "Shotgun Wedding by Uncle Sam?" Business Week, June 4,
2. Cheryl Wetzstein, "States Want Pro-Family Funds," The Washington Times,
December 10, 2001; Robin Toner and Robert Pear, "Bush Urges Work and Marriage
Programs in Welfare Plan," New York Times, February 27, 2002.
3. Jonathan Rauch, "The Widening Marriage Gap: America's New Class Divide,"
National Journal, Friday, May 18, 2001.
4. Cheryl Weitzstein, "Unwed Mothers Set a Record for Births," The Washington
Times, April 18, 2001.
5. See Jared Bernstein, Irv Garfinkel, and Sara McLanahan, A Progressive
Marriage Agenda, forthcoming from the Economic Policy Institute.
6. U.S. Bureau of the Census, "Historical Poverty Statistics -- Table 4. Poverty
Status of Families, by Type of Family, Presence of Related Children, Race, And
Hispanic Origin: 1959-2000," Available at http://www.census.gov. In 1999, 36
percent of single-mother households lived in poverty. Poverty in the U.S.
1999. Current Population Reports, P60-210 (Washington, D.C.: Government
Printing Office, 2000).
7. Alan Guttmacher Institute, "Married Mothers Fare the Best Economically, Even
If they Were Unwed at the Time they Gave Birth," Family Planning
Perspectives 31, no. 5: pp. 258-60, September, 1999; Ariel Halpern, "Poverty
Among Children Born Outside of Marriage: Preliminary Findings from the National
Survey of America's Families," (Washington, D.C.: The Urban Institute, 1999).
8. Calculations by Arloc Sherman, Children's Defense Fund, based on the March
2001 Current Population Survey.
9. Ibid. See also Neil G. Bennett, Jiali Li, Younghwan Song, and Keming Yang,
"Young Children in Poverty: A Statistical Update," released June 17, 1999. New
York: National Center for Children in Poverty,
10. Linda Giannarelli and James Barsimantov, Child Care Expenses of America's
Families, Occasional Paper Number 40 (Washington, D.C.: Urban Institute,
11. Rachel Schumacher and Mark Greenberg, Child Care After Leaving Welfare:
Early Evidence from State Studies (Washington, D.C.: Center for Law and
Social Policy, 1999).
12. Kathryn H. Porter and Allen Dupree, "Poverty Trends for Families Headed by
Working Single Mothers, 1993-1999," Center on Budget and Policy Priorities,
August 16, 2001. For full article: TARGET="outlink">http://www.cbpp.org/8-16-01wel.pdf.
13. Pamela Smock, "Cohabitation in the U.S.: An Appraisal of Research Themes,
Findings, and Implications," American Review of Sociology 26, no.1 (2000):
pp. 1-20.
14. Gregory Acs and Sandi Nelson, "'Honey, I'm Home.' Changes in Living
Arrangements in the Late 1990s," New Federalism: National Survey of America's
Families (The Urban Institute), June 2001, pp. 1-7. A new study by Johns
Hopkins researchers, presented on February 20, 2002 at a welfare forum in
Washington D.C., however, shows that these partnerships are unstable and may not
be better for children than single-parent households. See Robin Toner, "Two
Parents not Always Best for Children, Study Finds," New York Times,
February 20, 2002.
15. Many dual-earner families with preschool age children include a parent who
works evenings and nights in order to provide care during the day while their
husband or wife is at work. See Harriet Presser, "Employment Schedules Among
Dual-Earner Spouses and the Division of Household Labor by Gender," American
Sociological Review 59, no. 3 (June 1994): pp. 348-364.
16. Kristen Harknett and Sara McLanahan, "Do Perceptions of Marriage Explain
Marital Behavior? How Unmarried Parents' Assessments of the Benefits of Marriage
Relate to their Subsequent Marital Decision;" and Marcia Carlson, Sara McLanahan,
and Paula England, "Union Formation and Stability in Fragile Families," papers
presented at the meetings of the Population Association of America, Washington
D.C., April 2001.
17. More details on the Fragile Families study are available at
18. Maureen Waller, "High Hopes: Unwed Parents' Expectations About Marriage,"
Children and Youth Services Review 23 (2001): pp. 457-84.
19. Sara McLanahan, "Parent Absence or Poverty: Which Matters More?" pp. 35-48 in
Greg Duncan and Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, eds., Consequences of Growing Up Poor
(New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1997). On the impact of poverty in creating
non-marriage and marital disruption, see Aimee Dechter, "The Effect of Women's
Economic Independence on Union Dissolution," Working Paper Np. 92-98 (1992).
Center for Demography and Ecology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI; Mark
Testa et al, "Employment and Marriage among Inner-City Fathers," Annals of the
American Academy of Political and Social Science 501 (1989), pp. 79-91; Karen
Holden and Pamela Smock, "The Economic Costs of Marital Dissolution: Why Do Women
bear a Disproportionate Cost?" Annual Review of Sociology 17 (1991), pp.
51-58. On the association of low income with domestic violence see Kristin
Anderson, "Gender, Status, and Domestic violence," Journal of Marriage and the
Family 59 (1997), pp. 655-670; A. M. Moore, "Intimate Violence: Does
Socioeconomic Status Matter?" in A.P. Gardarelli, ed., Violence Between
Intimate Partners (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1997), pp. 90-100; A. J. Sedlack
and D.D. Broadhurst, D.D., Third National Incidence Study of Child Abuse and
Neglect: Final Report (Washington D.C.: Department of Health and Human
Services 1996).
20. Daniel T. Lichter, Marriage as Public Policy (Washington, D.C:
Progressive Policy Institute, September 2001).
21. Kathryn Edin, "A Few Good Men: Why Poor Mothers Don't Marry or Remarry?"
The American Prospect, January 3, 2000, p. 28; Kathryn Edin and Laura
Lein, Making Ends Meet: How Single Mothers Survive Welfare and Low-Wage
Work (New York: Russell Sage, 1998).
22. Valerie Oppenheimer and Vivian Lew, "American Marriage Formation in the
1980s," in Karen Mason and An-Magritt Jensen, eds, Gender and Family Change in
Industrialized Countries (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), pp. 105-38;
Sharon Sassler and Robert Schoen, "The Effects of Attitudes and Economic Activity
on Marriage," Journal of Marriage and the Family 61 (1999): pp.
23. John Billy and David Moore, "A Multilevel Analysis of Marital and Nonmarital
Fertility in the U.S.," Social Forces 70 (1992), pp. 977-1011; Sara
McLanahan and Irwin Garfinkel, "Welfare is No Incentive," The New York
Times, July 29, 1994, p. A13; Elaine McCrate, "Expectations of Adult Wages
and Teenage Childbearing," International Review of Applied Economics 6
(1992) pp. 309-328; Ellen Coughlin, "Policy Researchers Shift the Terms of the
Debate on Women's Issues," The Chronicle of Higher Education, May 31,
1989; Marian Wright Edelman, Families in Peril: An Agenda for Social
Change (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1987), p. 55; Lawrence Lynn and
Michael McGeary, eds, Inner-City Poverty in the United States (Washington,
D.C.: National Academy Press, 1990), pp. 163-67; Jonathan Crane, "The Epidemic
Theory of Ghetto and Neighborhood Effects on Dropping Out and Teenaged
Childbearing," American Journal of Sociology 96 (1991), pp. 1226-59; Sara
McLanahan and Lynne Casper, "Growing Diversity and Inequality in the American
Family," in Reynolds Farley, State of the Union, Vol. 2, pp 10-11; Mike
Males, "Poverty, Rape, Adult/Teen Sex: Why 'Pregnancy Prevention' Programs Don't
Work," Phi Delta Kappan, January 1994, p.409; Mike Males, "In Defense of
Teenaged Mothers," The Progressive, August 1994, p. 23.
24. Dian McLaughlin and Daniel Lichter, Poverty and the Marital Behavior of Young
Women," Journal of Marriage and the Family 59, no.3 (1997): pp. 582-94.
25. Wendy Single-Rushton and Sara McLanahan, "For Richer or Poorer?" manuscript,
Center for Research on Child Well-Being, Princeton University, July 2001, p. 4;
Kathryn Edin, "What do Low-Income Single Mothers Say About Marriage?" Social
Problems 47 (2000), pp. 112-33.
26. Robert Nakosteen and Michael Zimmer, "Man, Money, and Marriage: Are High
Earners More Prone than Low Earners to Marry?" Social Science Quarterly 78
(1997): pp. 66-82.
27. Francine D. Blau, Lawrence W. Kahn and Jane Waldfogel, "Understanding Young
Women's Marriage Decisions: The Role of Labor and Marriage Market Conditions,"
Industrial and Labor Relations Review 53, no. 4 (July 2000): pp.
28.Robert Nakosteen and Michael Zimmer, "Men, Money, and Marriage" Social
Science Quarterly 78 (1997), pp. ; Frank F. Furstenberg, Jr. "The Future of
Marriage," American Demographics 18 (June 1996), pp. 39-40; Francine Blau,
Lawrence Kahn, and Jane Waldfogel, "Understanding Young Women's Marriage
Decisions," Industrial and Labor Relations Review 53 (2000): pp.
29. William A. Darity, Jr. and Samuel L. Myers, Jr., "Family Structure and the
Marginalization of Black Men," Policy Implications" in The Decline in Marriage
Among African Americans: Causes, Consequences, and Policy Implications, ed.
M. Belinda Tucker and Claudia Mitchell-Kernan. (New York: Russell Sage
Foundation, 1995), pp. 263-308.
30. Daniel.T. Lichter, D. McLaughlin, F. LeClere, G. Kephart, and D. Landry,
"Race and the Retreat from Marriage: A Shortage of Marriageable Men?" American
Sociological Review 57 (December 1992): pp. 781-99.
31. Ron Mincy, Columbia University, personal communication, February 18,
32. Mavis Hetherington, For Better or for Worse: Divorce Reconsidered (New
York: W. W. Norton, 2001); Paul Amato and Alan Booth, "The Legacy of Parents'
Marital Discord," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 81 (2001),
pp. 627-638; Andrew Cherlin, "Going to Extremes: Family Structure, Children's
Well-Being, and Social Science," Demography 36 (November 1999): pp.
33. Elizabeth Cooksey, "Consequences of Young Mothers' Marital Histories for
Children's Cognitive Development," Journal of Marriage and the Family 59
(May 1997), pp. 245-62; Juan Battle, "What Beats Having Two Parents? Educational
Outcomes for African American Students in Single- Versus Dual-Parent Families,"
Journal of Black Studies 28 (1998), p. 783-802.
34. Ron Mincy and Chen-Chung Huang, "'Just Get Me to the Church...': Assessing
Policies to Promote Marriage among Fragile Families," manuscript prepared for the
MacArthur Foundation Network on the Family and the Economy Meeting, Evanston,
Illinois, November 30, 2001. Contact Ron Mincy, School of Social Work, Columbia
35. Research by Andrew Cherlin and Paula Fomby at Johns Hopkins University, as
reported in Robin Toner, "Two Parents Not Always Best for Children," New York
Times, February 21, 2002.
36. Frank Furstenberg, Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, and S. Philip Morgan, Adolescent
Mothers in Later Life (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987).
37. Frank Furstenberg, "Is the Modern Family a Threat to Children's Health?"
Society 36 (1999): p. 35.
38. Richard Gelles, "Constraints Against Family Violence," American Behavioral
Scientist 36 (1993), pp. 575-86; A. J. Sedlack and D.D. Broadhurst, Third
National Incidence Study of Child Abuse and Neglect: Final Report
(Washington, D.C.: Department of Health and Human Services, 1996); Kristin
Anderson, "Gender, Status and Domestic Violence," Journal of Marriage and the
Family 59 (1997), 655-670; Jacqueline Payne and Martha Davis, "Testimony of
NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund on Child Support and Fatherhood
Initiatives," submitted to the United States House Human Resources Subcommittee
of the Ways and Means Committee, June 28, 2001.
39. Catherine Kenney and Sara McLanahan, "Are Cohabiting Relationship More
Violent Than Marriages?" manuscript, Princeton University; E.D. Leonard, 1994,
"Battered Women and Criminal Justice: A Review (doctoral dissertation cited in
Todd Migliaccio, "Abused Husbands: A Narrative Analysis," Journal of Family
Issues 23 (2002), 26-52; K.D. O'Leary et al, "Prevalence and Stability of
Physical Aggression Between Spouses: A Longitudinal Analysis," Journal of
Consulting and Clinical Psychology 57 (1989), pp. 263-68.
40. National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University,
"Back to School 1999 National Survey of American Attitudes on Substance Abuse
V: Teens and their Parents," August 1999. See also Irvin Molotsky, "Study Links
Teenage Substance Abuse and Paternal Ties," New York Times, Aug. 31,
41. "Census Bureau Reports Poor Two-Parent Families Are about Twice as Likely to
Break Up as Two-Parent Families not in Poverty," New York Times, January
15, 1993, p. A6; Don Burroughs, "Love and Money," U.S. News & World
Report, October 19, 1992, p. 58; Scott South, Katherine Trent, and Yang Shen,
"Changing Partners: Toward a Macrostructural-Opportunity Theory of Marital
Dissolution," Journal of Marriage and Family 63, no.3 (2001):743-754. Also
see note 17.
42. Michelle Budig and Paula England, "The Wage Penalty for Motherhood,"
American Sociological Review 66 (2001): pp. 204-225; Heather Joshi,
Pierella Paci, and Jane Waldfogel. 1999. "The Wages of Motherhood: Better or
Worse," Cambridge Journal of Economics 23, no.5 (1999): pp. 543-564. Jane
Waldfogel, "The Effect of Children on Women's Wages," American Sociological
Review 62:2 (1997): pp. 209-217.
43. "Young Children in Poverty: A Statistical Update," June 1999 Edition.
Released June 17, 1999, prepared by Neil G. Bennett, Jiali Li, Younghwan Song,
and Keming Yang. New York: National Center for Children in Poverty,
TARGET="outlink">http://cpmcnet.columbia.edu/dept/nccp/99uptext.html. Data
for 2000 from CPS,
44. Nancy Folbre, Who Pays for the Kids? Gender and the Structures of
Constraint (New York: Routledge, 1994); Ann Crittenden, The Price of
Motherhood (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2001); Sylvia Ann Hewlett and
Cornell West, The War Against Parents (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1998).
45. Joan Williams, Unbending Gender. Why Family and Work Conflict and What to
Do About It. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000).
46. Ann Crittenden, The Price of Motherhood. Why the Most Important Job in the
World is Still the Least Valued (New York: Henry Holt, 2001).
47. Timothy Smeeding, Barbara Boyle Torrey and Martin Rein, "Patterns of Income
and Poverty: The Economic Status of Children and the Elderly in Eight Countries,"
in John L Palmer, Timothy Smeeding, and Barbara Boyle Torrey, eds., The
Vulnerable (Washington, D.C.: Urban Institute Press, 1988); Susan Houseknecht
and Jaya Sastry, "Family 'Decline' and Child Well-Being: A Comparative
Assessment," Journal of Marriage and the Family 58 (1996); Sara McLanahan
and Irwin Garfinkel, "Single-Mother Families and Social Policy: Lessons for the
United States from Canada, France, and Sweden," pp. 367-83 in K. McFate, R.
Lawson, W. J. Wilson eds., Poverty, Inequality, and the Future of Social
Policy: Western States in the New World Order (New York: Russell Sage
Foundation, 1995). Michael J. Graetz and Jerry L. Mashaw, True Security.
Rethinking American Social Insurance (New Haven: Yale University Press,
48. Marcia K. Meyers, Janet C. Gornick, and Laura R. Peck. 2001. "Packaging
Support for Low-Income Families: Policy Variation Across the U.S. States,"
Journal of Policy Analysis and Management 20, no. 3: pp. 457-483.
49. Table 7-6, Green Book 2000. Committee on Ways and Means, U.S. House
of Representatives, 106th Congress. Available at
50. President's Council of Economic Advisors, The Effects of Welfare Policy
and the Economic Expansion of Welfare Caseloads: An Update (Washington, D.C.:
Council of Economic Advisors, 1999).
51. 2000 Kids Count Data Online,
52. Jennifer Steinhauer, "States Proved Unpredictable in Aiding Uninsured
Children," New York Times, September 28, 2000. See also Leighton Ku and
Brian Bruen, "The Continuing Decline in Medicaid Coverage" Series A, No. A-37
(Washington, D.C.: Urban Institute, 1999); Sheila Zedlewski and Sarah Brauner,
"Are the Steep Declines in Food Stamp Participation Linked to Falling Welfare
Caseloads?" Series B, No. B-3 (Washington, D.C.: Urban Institute, 1999).
53. Rachel Schumacher and Mark Greenberg, Child Care After Leaving Welfare:
Early Evidence from State Studies. Washington, D.C.: Center for Law and
Social Policy, 1999). On the added costs of child care and care-giving activities
for low-income families, see Jody Heymann, The Widening Gap: Why America's
Working Families Are in Jeopardy and What Can Be Done about It (New York:
Basic Books, 2000).
54. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Money Income and Poverty
in the U.S., 1999. Figures for 2000 from
55. Patricia Ruggles, Drawing the Line. Alternative Poverty Measures and Their
Implications for Public Policy ( Washington, D.C.: The Urban Institute Press,
1990); Constance Citro and Robert Michael, eds. Measuring Poverty: A New
Approach (Washington, D.C.: National Academy of Science, 1995); Jared
Bernstein, Chauna Brocht, Maggie Spade-Aguilar, How Much is Enough? Basic
Family Budgets for Working Families (Washington, D.C.: Economic Policy
Institute, 2000).
56. Robert Greenstein, "Should EITC Benefits Be Enlarged for Families with Three
or More Children?" Washington, D.C.: Center on Budget and Policy Priorities,
2000. http://www.cbpp.org/3-14-tax.htm.
57. David Ellwood and Jeffrey B. Liebman, "The Middle Class Parent Penalty: Child
Benefits in the U.S. Tax Code," Manuscript, John F. Kennedy School of Government,
Harvard University, Boston, MA., 2000.
58. Robert Cherry and Max Sawicky, "Giving Tax Credit Where Credit is Due,"
Briefing Paper (Washington, D.C.: Economic Policy Institute, April 2000).
Available at http://www.epinet.org/briefingpapers/eitc.html.
59. Ronald B. Mincy, "Marriage, Child Poverty, and Public Policy," American
Experiment Quarterly, 4:2 (Summer 2001): pp. 68-71. See also Wendy
Sigle-Rushton and Sara McLanahan, "For Richer or Poorer?" manuscript, Center for
Research on Child Well-Being, Princeton University.
60. Julianne Malveaux, "More Jobs, Not More Marriages, Lift Poor," U.S.A.
Today, February 22, 2002, p. 15A.


text:
Mobile development
Orçamento £20-250 GBP
I need an iPhone/iPad app. I would like it designed and built. I'm looking for somebody to create an app for apple and android.
The requirements are to create a bicycle mechanic app that they can bid for a job within their area.
Needs to have certain criteria, like customers details, location etc...Also a profile of mechanics with their details, experience etc...
With an option for the mechanic to get paid once work is complete and a review/feedback can be given from the customer.
Also needs a map option for customer and mechanic.
43 freelancers estão ofertando em média £590 para esse trabalho
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We are happy to discuss our proposal with you. KEY POINTS THAT MAKE US DIFFER FROM OTHERS: ~ We have 5+ years of experiences in Unity 3D, Xcode, CoCoa 2d, Phonegap and major iOS and Android developement. ~ 150+ su Mais
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Hello, Do you have a design? Can you please share it so that I can estimate how many hours I need to implement. I would like to charge £25/hour if I am hired. Thanks.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
There will forever be something cool about a simple carburetor under the hood of your hot rod. Even though in these days of smart phones, iPads, and specifically in our world, self-learning EFI and programmable ignitions, some gearheads, even those with the modern third generation small-block, like to have the carb as an option. We have to admit that even though we love the easy power and affordability of the Gen III SBC, it's an ugly engine. The coil packs and wiring clutters the engine bay and without relocating them or going with aftermarket coil covers, these late model motors lack the smoothness of a conventional small-block, especially if you're sporting one in an old muscle car.
Such was the case for the mildly-cammed LQ9 we dropped in our 1966 Chevelle project car. Our goal was to put together an LS that looked like a factory GM powerplant from the 1960's. By using a carbureted LS intake manifold from Edelbrock (PN 71187) painted Chevy Orange and a 650 cfm Holley four barrel, we planned to make a new engine look nostalgic, while maintaining the factory coil-on-plug ignition. To do so, we set the car up with MSD's 6LS ignition system (PN 6010), which is the simplest way we've found to swap a carb onto the LS powerplant. By working off of the LS' 24-tooth reluctor wheel (MSD's 6LS-2 works off of the 58-tooth wheel), the 6LS box handles your LS engine's timing (not fuel) and can either be programmed with different timing curves with a laptop computer, vacuum style advance, or pre-programmed chips you plug into the box. By being able to map different ignition curves, adding nitrous or boost to your combination is easy and MSD's comprehensive Pro-Data+ software makes navigation a breeze. By the way, to install this piece you only need four connections; the coils, the MAP sensor, the crank sensor, and the cam sensor.
We had our nostalgic LQ9 engine in our Chevelle and running in no time, but like all brand new engine combos, it needed some tweaks for it to run as well as possible. It ran very rich (10.5:1 A/F ratio) and when you matted the throttle we could hear some detonation (pinging). Also, when we'd shut it off it wanted to keep running. Plus, we didn't know if the pre-programmed timing ramp chip we were running was even correct for a street car. Of course, wondering how much horsepower it put to the wheels was another reason why we contacted Westech Performance Group in Mira Loma, California. Master tuner Eric Rhee was able to work his magic and get the most from our reliable combo by adjusting the timing ramps and tweaking the carburetor and we even managed to pick up some horsepower while he was at it too. Here's what he did to make our Chevelle's tune ideal.
Quick Specs
- Runs a carbureted LS engine without complicated EFI hardware
- Map a timing curve using Pro-Data+ software
- Programmable two-step rev limiter, vacuum advance curve and step retard
- Direct plug-in to factory components
- Programmable via a PC through MSD's Pro-Data+ software
- Does NOT control fuel


text:
The Energy We Overlook
Carbon dioxide is not the only greenhouse gas (GHG). In fact, it accounts for only about half of the climate warming effect. But as a practical matter, the clearest path to reducing GHGs is to cut out carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels. There are three generic means of doing this: to get serious about conservation; to substitute other energy sources for fossil fuels; and to capture and sequester the CO2 from fossil-fuel combustion. Let's take them in order of priority. By "priority," I mean the potential of each approach to produce gains large enough not just to meet Kyoto-scale goals, but essentially to "zero out" CO2 emissions in the coming century.
Conservation. The energy industry routinely brushes this off as a non-starter, by suggesting that energy conservation means energy deprivation. This argument echoes the predictions of nuclear industry advocates of a generation ago, who told us that if we tried to rely on conservation and didn't embrace nuclear power, we would find ourselves "freezing in the dark" (a pro-nuclear bumper sticker from the early 1980s). We didn't, because a critical part of conservation is efficiency-getting the same mileage, or lighting, or heat, with less energy than before, and in the 1970s we began learning how to do that. Now, there are some simple measures for achieving greater "end-use" efficiency that could be introduced quickly and would cost very little-and in some cases would actually pay for themselves in a few months or years. There are also prospects for making more radical, long-term, improvements in energy efficiency, both in its production and in every stage of its use.
Substitution. The nuclear industry is already licking its lips about making a comeback in public esteem. It is advertising heavily that it offers a "clean air" alternative to coal and oil. But even if the problems that have caused the current public disenchantment with this industry could be solved overnight, nuclear power plants take up to ten years to design, site, and build. Moreover, they are not cheaper than fossil fuel-fired power plants. And the nuclear industry is relatively mature, so the prospects for sharp cost reductions are dim at best.
Other non-carbon power sources are more promising. They include hydro-electricity (especially from small "low-head" dams), wind power, solar power, geothermal power, ocean currents, and solar power satellites. At present, all except small hydroelectric facilities would be more costly than big central power stations, at least if the social and environmental costs of fossil fuel combustion continue to be ignored. Large-scale deployment of standardized mass-produced wind or solar powered units that could bring unit costs down dramatically could take two or three decades. There is an inevitable lag as market size and production costs move in synchrony. Geothermal power and ocean currents are wild cards that could be helpful in some, but not most, locations. Solar satellites are, for the moment, a very long shot.
According to conventional wisdom, none of these options can individually substitute for a large percentage of the existing fossil fuel-based energy supply. Taken together, however, these options can have a major impact. Moreover, conventional wisdom may be too myopic. The main reason wind and solar power are not usually taken seriously as potential substitutes for coal and oil in satisfying the power needs of most countries is that they provide only intermittent supply. The wind does not always blow and the sun does not always shine. But solutions to the problems of intermittency are feasible, and some are already under development.
Sequestration. Not to be confused with the sequestering of carbon in trees, this technological sequestration would involve intercepting emissions before they can dissipate into the atmosphere, and locking the carbon up. It appears that this approach may be quite cost-effective for certain large-scale users-especially coal fired steam-electric power plants, which currently account for about a third of the carbon dioxide produced in the United States. It also appears that the captured gas can be utilized quite productively, especially in repressurizing (extending the productive life of) aging oil and gas fields.
These three generic approaches are listed in inverse order of attractiveness to the existing fossil-fuel energy complex. The third approach is the one the established non-nuclear energy industries will prefer, and they will lobby hard to secure government funding and support for it, while undermining efforts to promote alternatives. Every U.S. politician from a district with an oil well, a coal mine, or a gas pipeline will be tempted to support this approach, but only after the political pressure to "do something" about climate warming has become irresistible. It hasn't yet.
What Offers the Largest Potential for Cutting Greenhouse Gas Emissions?
The answer, perhaps surprisingly, is conservation. To rely much more on conservation does not mean "freezing in the dark." Nor does it mean depending on voluntary individual choices to reduce domestic consumption, although that can't hurt. What it really means is to sharply increase the efficiency with which energy is used throughout the economy.
In the early 1970s, electricity demand in the United States had been rising for 20 years at about 8 percent per year. Some voices urged conservation then, as they do now. So the U.S. government promoted several "independent" (but noticeably orchestrated) studies of the potential for conservation savings. These studies all concluded that (1) conservation was a good idea but (2) the maximum potential savings were only around 15 to 20 percent, and (3) demand was going to keep on rising at the same rate as in the immediate past. In other words, this potential for conservation savings would be used up by two or three years of growth at 8 percent per year.
The implication of these studies was that many more new power plants and refineries would be needed before the end of the century. That view was reinforced by the propaganda of the nuclear industry in the 1980s, when it was fighting for survival in the wake of the reactor accident at Three Mile Island. Those projections turned out to be wrong. And a main reason was that the potential for conservation was grossly underestimated then-as it is now. Dick Cheney and George W. Bush, in making their energy policy proclamations of 2001, could well have lifted their projections from that decades-old nuclear industry propaganda.
One reason for underestimating conservation potential arose from a fundamental but very wide-spread misunderstanding of the science of thermodynamics. Most engineers and economists assumed that energy was already being used quite efficiently. It was the prevailing view, based largely on a study carried out by the Livermore National Laboratory for the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy (JCAE) of the U.S. Congress, which concluded that the U.S. economy in 1970 was achieving an astonishing overall efficiency of 47.5 percent. Efficiency was defined as the ratio of "useful" energy (output) to "total" energy (input). The finding was offered with a straight face, so to speak, despite the fact that not a single energy conversion system in operation at the time could come close to matching that performance.
The deception lay in the assumption that most of the heat energy consumed by industry, and by residences and commercial establishments for space-heating, cooking, hot water, etc., was being used as efficiently as possible-that is, at an efficiency of 70 percent or more. This underlying assumption was built into virtually all official studies and recommendations. If the country's economy as a whole were already 47.5 percent efficient, there couldn't be much additional potential for conservation. In effect, the JCAE conclusion, echoed by others, blinded policymakers and investors to the possibility that further efficiency gains were possible.
The implicit definition of efficiency used in that official study in 1973 (and still accepted by most of the industry people who haven't had a good course in thermodynamics) is deceptive. The error was pointed out clearly by a summer study sponsored by the American Physical Society in 1975. But that study received much less publicity-and is much harder to read-than the official report to the Congress's Joint Committee and its numerous clones and progeny.
What was the error? By definition, a measure of efficiency must be a fraction-a number less than one. The denominator of the ratio, on the bottom, must be the energy actually used, by the economy as a whole, or by some industry, or factory, or appliance. The smaller numerator, on the top, should represent the minimum physically possible amount of energy required to achieve the same outcome, whether in tons of steel produced or hamburgers cooked. Only by this kind of comparison can we see how much room there is for future improvement.
That is not always the kind of ratio used, however. The gas industry likes to advertise that gas furnaces are about 80 percent efficient-by which it means that 80 percent of the heat produced goes into the house and only 20 percent goes up the flue. No doubt, this is an improvement over the 50 percent or so that leaked out of the house from coal-burning furnaces in the past. But that comparison is quite misleading, because it is fundamentally wasteful to use very high temperature heat for home heating. The important clue is that 70 degrees F., the temperature you probably want to keep your house at, is almost exactly the temperature of the waste heat from a conventional steam-electric power plant.
Why is that a clue? Let us suppose, for purposes of argument, that electric power plants need not be big. (If electronics can be miniaturized, why not electricity generation?) Suppose the fuel used to heat your house were used instead to produce electricity. The electricity could run the lights and all the appliances in your house, and maybe your neighbor's house, and the waste heat would still take care of the space heating. In other words, the heat would be a free byproduct. (This sort of system-known as "district heating"-is quite common in Europe, by the way. It can pose practical difficulties due to the distance between the power plant and the housing. But that is irrelevant to the question of what the true energy conservation potential is for heating buildings.) Moreover, conventional electric power plants are not as efficient as theoretically possible. For instance, the overall efficiency can be raised considerably by putting a gas turbine in front of the steam turbine, and using the hot gases from the gas turbine to heat the steam. This so-called "combined cycle" can achieve efficiencies as high as 60 percent-because some of the heat energy overlooked by the conventional energy accounting is now being used. And still, the waste heat at the end of the cascade is enough to heat your house.
In short, the minimum physically possible amount of energy needed to heat the house could theoretically be provided by a scheme that makes far better use of the same fuel. In other words, the true efficiency of the gas furnace is far lower than advertised. The APS summer study estimated that space heating in 1970 by means of an oil- or gas-fired furnace, and distributed by hot water or steam radiators, was only 6 percent efficient, in contrast to the 70 percent or so assumed by the JCAE study.
By this sort of test, the U.S. economy in the mid-1970s was nowhere near 47.5 percent efficient. In 1975, I tried (with a colleague) to revise the JCAE estimate of the energy efficiency of the US economy, based on the principles explained by the APS summer study. Our first estimate, using 1968-73 data, came up with less than 2 percent. A later effort, using 1979 data and slightly more conservative assumptions, arrived at about 2.5 percent. The methodology of such calculations is arguable, especially in regard to deciding on what is the "minimum possible." But even with more traditional assumptions on that point, the real efficiency of the U.S. economy (and others around the world) is not more than a few percent at most. A very safe estimate would be less than 5 percent. What this means is that there is ample room to cut energy consumption, without cutting standards of living, for a long time to come.
Policies to Pump-Prime Efficiency
Some economists have advocated a carbon tax on fossil fuels, to reduce demand for such fuels and thereby cut CO2 emissions. Model exercises have explored the possibility, and it turns out (as one might expect) that the outcome of this exercise depends upon what is done with the proceeds of the tax. The models tend to suggest that if the tax money is returned to consumers, or if it is spent by the government, employment and the growth rate will fall. On the other hand, if the tax funds are used to cut the existing social-security and value-added taxes on labor-thus reducing the effective cost of labor vis-a-vis energy-the macro-economic effects (on employment and growth) can be beneficial. Moreover, if a fraction of the proceeds is spent on energy research and development (R&D), there may be a double dividend-an economic spur to go along with the reduced carbon emissions.
In the 1970s, the U.S. government did help considerably by introducing the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards for new automobiles and the Public Utility Regulation and Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act of 1978 (PURPA). The first of these laws simply mandated gradually better fuel economy for cars, leaving it up to the manufacturers to figure out how to achieve that result. The car-makers did so (kicking and screaming, to be sure) mostly by reducing vehicle size and weight and improving aerodynamics and tires. By 1988, U.S. automotive fuel economy was over twice as high as it had been in 1972, and roughly equal to the averages for Europe and Japan. The other law, PURPA, allowed utilities to make more profits for stockholders by producing power more efficiently. This was a sharp change from the earlier system in which a utility could increase its income only by building new capacity at a standard rate of return on investment fixed by regulators. (In those days, any savings from more efficient operation had to be passed on to consumers as lower prices. So why bother?)
The new law aimed to do something else as well: to force utilities to buy excess power from private producers at the utilities' marginal cost of production. Anyone with a small windmill or hydroelectric dam, or a cogeneration plant (making electricity from waste heat) could sell unneeded power back to the local utility at a known price. The utilities didn't like it, of course, because their control systems were not designed for decentralized production. They discouraged small suppliers as much as possible by imposing high "connection charges." Even so, many of them found themselves for the first time with excess capacity. A few utilities in regions that were growing rapidly and did not have excess capacity, notably in California, then found it worthwhile to help consumers save energy so as to delay the need for costly new generating capacity. (New plants were always more costly than older ones, due to rising land prices and increasingly strict environmental regulation.) This "demand-side management," as it was called by alternative-energy pioneer Amory Lovins, proved to be another effective tool for inducing conservation.
Lovins correctly predicted that thanks to such conservation, energy demand would not continue to increase at the historical rate. And indeed, between 1972 and 1988, conservation saved roughly a third of the energy that would have been needed had the industry and government experts been accurate in their forecasts.
Have we squeezed most of the potential from conservation by now? Far from it. In fact, we have barely scratched the surface. Take motor vehicles, the source of a third of the CO2 emissions in the United States and other industrialized countries. The CAFE standards have not been tightened since the 1980s, and automotive fuel economy has ceased to improve. In fact, as most readers of this publication will be ruefully aware, the popularity of sports utility vehicles (SUVs)-classed as "trucks" to avoid strict regulation-has turned the trend in the wrong direction. Yet numerous studies confirm that fuel economy could be at least tripled by exploiting light but strong space-age composite materials (based on carbon fibers), using aerospace-related integrated design concepts that minimize the need for heavy steel frames, and using hybrid or fuel-cell propulsion units.
The Bush administration, under pressure from the auto industry, opposes any extension of CAFE standards. Yet, the US auto industry did not suffer when the first CAFE law went into effect. (The period of increasingly intensive import competition from Japan in the 1980s was rough, for a while, but Japanese competition had much less to do with fuel economy than reliability.) A new CAFE standard, forcing fleet average fuel economy for all new vehicles (including SUVs) to twice the current level over a period of 15 years or so would be nearly painless for consumers and a very valuable inducement to technological innovation for the industry. And there is no reason to worry about the so-called "rebound effect" (the idea that increased efficiency will only lead to increased consumption) in this case. True, consumers might save some money by paying for less fuel, but alternative uses of that money would certainly be less energy-intensive than driving SUVs to the shopping mall.
The impact of tougher CAFE standards on energy consumption could be magnified by another device, which Amory Lovins has called the "fee-bate." Each vehicle with a lower-than-standard fuel economy would be taxed in proportion to its excess use of fuel, while each vehicle with better than standard fuel economy would receive a proportional rebate. The money collected from the first group would pay for the rebates to the second group. This should satisfy the people who think that money collected by the government is always misspent.
The principles of the CAFE standards and the fee-bate scheme could just as well be applied to a number of other products, from refrigerators to home heating systems. In fact, by far the largest opportunities for increased end-use efficiency are to be found in the domain of residential and commercial buildings. Technologically, it is possible to reduce heating requirements for new buildings by as much as 90 percent, even in cold climates, by a combination of better insulation, better windows (triple-glazed with tight seals), and better design to utilize solar heat in the winter but exclude it in the summer. Extra costs for the insulation and high-performance windows are largely compensated for by the opportunity to meet all heating and cooling needs with a climate control system of lower capacity, thereby reducing capital costs. Solar photovoltaic (PV) panels on the roof can reduce the need for purchased power from the central utility. If the resulting structure costs a bit more-which it need not, in many locations-the difference would pay for itself in lower heating and cooling costs over its lifetime.
For older buildings, the potential is not nearly so great, at least on a per-building basis, but older buildings outnumber new ones. And retrofitting windows and roof panels can still cut heating needs substantially, while providing supplementary electric power at low marginal cost. Because a PV roof panel serves two functions (both power and heat), it spreads the cost base. In this application, PVs are already cost-effective in some locations and as manufacturing costs decline they will soon be more so.
Why aren't these things being done on a large scale already? Part of the answer is sheer inertia. The building industry is very decentralized. It is also very conservative, as are most of its customers. Very few builders have the technological expertise to exploit the most energy-efficient techniques, and most don't even know about the possibilities-mainly because there is no competitive pressure for them to investigate these things. The pressure on home builders is essentially to maximize usable (and visible) floor space per dollar. Consumers do not often ask about future operating costs. And more importantly, mortgage financing institutions do not insist that they do so, even though there is an apparent incentive for lenders to assure themselves that borrowers are aware of-and can afford to pay-the full costs of ownership, not just the mortgage repayments.
Public awareness campaigns, like those initiated in the 1970s in response to the oil crisis, can help. But the real gains from conservation, especially in the decentralized residential and consumer sectors, will probably require a push from regulation. There are a number of ways to do this, but the one I favor would be to work through mortgage lenders and utilities. New houses could be sold as a complete package of services, including the house and its equipment, all the necessary utilities (accompanied by long-term contracts), and insurance. The base cost to the buyer would include payments not only for the mortgage, but also for all primary utilities, on a pre-specified sliding scale of increased rates for increased energy use.
How could this be achieved? What's needed is an organization to do the "packaging" of the service components. As matters stand today, builders build; banks lend; utilities supply electricity or water or gas. Combining these services in a single consumer-friendly package could be beneficial for all concerned, and a clever entrepreneur should be able to make a profit by doing so. In a competitive free market, deregulated utilities should be prepared to compete for such business with the commercial builders (not the individual consumers), and the insurance companies should insure the delivery of promised utility services, as well as the usual protections against structural problems, accidents, and hazards.
Notwithstanding the conservatism of the residential housing sector, studies by the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory and others indicate that with appropriate government policies in place, the residential and commercial use of energy can be cut by 50 percent or even more by mid-century, while the carbon emissions can be cut by 75 percent. Insulation, alone, will sharply reduce heat requirements. Most of the reduced amounts then required will be provided by solar collectors, small on-site generating units (fuel cells) with PVs, supplemented by electric heat pumps (as air-conditioning is now). The rest will come from natural gas or hydrogen. And the purchased electric power component can be made significantly less carbon-intensive by utilizing more low-head hydroelectricity, wind power, solar power, and industrial co-generation.
In those industries that have been traditional "big" users of energy (transportation, electric power generation, petroleum refining, metals, cement, glass, pulp and paper, and chemicals), fuels constitute such a large share of their overall costs that most of the obvious ways of cutting fuel use have been tried. In these industries, only more radical changes in technology will make much difference. In the electric power sector, the combined-cycle use of gas turbines and steam turbines has the potential to significantly increase thermal efficiency from its present plateau of 33 percent (including distribution losses) to 50 or even 60 percent. Newly constructed facilities already employ this technology. However, existing plants cannot be retrofitted for higher efficiency, so progress will occur slowly as total capacity increases and older plants are phased out and replaced. Unfortunately, the Bush administration seems intent on allowing old plants with obsolete pollution control systems to operate even longer, rather than encouraging their replacement.
In those "old economy" manufacturing and service industries in which energy is only a minor cost compared to those of labor and capital, the main incentives have been to save on labor, even if it means more mechanization and more use of energy. As a result, these sectors offer surprisingly numerous opportunities for what Amory Lovins has called "free lunches"-savings that cost nothing or that pay for themselves very quickly. Economists have been very skeptical about this, on the grounds that if there were major opportunities to save energy and money, the profit incentive would operate to make sure that such opportunities are not persistently overlooked. The fact remains that many such opportunities still exist, however-most likely because managers are much less concerned with finding small savings than they are with finding new markets and "growth."
Non-Carbon Alternatives
Of all the non-carbon alternatives1-water power, wind power, solar heat, photovoltaic electricity, tidal power, and geothermal power-the least expensive by far is low-head waterpower from small dams. In areas that have flowing streams and consistent rainfall, all that is needed to encourage more of these small generating units is to ensure that excess power can be fed back into the network efficiently. This is also a necessary-though not sufficient-condition for large-scale adoption of wind power and solar photovoltaic power.
Wind is the next cheapest. Western Europe is adopting wind power rapidly, albeit with some help from subsidies. But the subsidies have already created a significant market for the units, and this has brought a number of competitors into the field. Individual units are getting larger, now up to 1 megawatt, and costs are dropping sharply. A further 50 percent reduction is expected before 2010.
There is plenty of wind potential. Europe could generate two or even three times its current demand for electric power from wind. A similar potential exists in North America. However, so far the potential for stand-alone wind units has been relatively limited because of intermittence of both supply and demand. The grid has its raison d'etre. Until recently, it was technically quite difficult to integrate many small independent suppliers (that were also occasional net users) into the same grid that served the utilities' own large base-load plants. Most utilities have tried to discourage small retail power producers, either by means of high connection charges or legal restrictions. However, modern computer capabilities have largely eliminated the coordination problem, and it should not be a major barrier in the future.
For a long time, it has been assumed that local storage of energy-the thing that would really allow wind and solar power to take off-is not a serious option. But this is changing. The National Power PLC of Britain is developing a new type of regenerative fuel cell that is suitable for large-scale applications. As presently configured, it consists of tanks of sodium bromide and sodium polysulfide (there are many possible electrochemical couples). These concentrated salt solutions react electrochemically across a membrane, producing a cell voltage of 1.5 V. The cells can be combined in series (like any battery) to get higher voltages, and in parallel to get more power. The amount of energy stored is limited only by the size of the tanks. The storage capacity can be adjusted to a few minutes (to smooth out peaks) or to many hours. The technology has been tested in the laboratory and at pilot scale. A plant now being built in the United Kingdom is rated at 120 mWh of energy-storage capacity and up to 15 mW power rating.
It is true that at present, none of the alternatives mentioned (except hydropower) can compete economically with a large-scale conventional coal-fired power plant-assuming, as noted earlier, that the social and ecological costs of the coal-fired plant are ignored. However this does not mean that there are no cost-effective applications for renewables. On the contrary, there are already quite a few, with more to come. Mass production brings costs down dramatically-look at the history of the Ford Model T, or of the computer. Wind turbines and PV panels are still semi-customized products, made in rather small numbers. But in both of these industries, private investment is rising and capacity is growing at about 30 percent per year.
Getting CO2 Out of Circulation
Techniques for capturing and sequestering carbon dioxide from thermal power plants have been gaining in credibility (and funding) in recent years. The costs can apparently be kept quite low, provided there is a convenient way to store or otherwise dispose of the carbon dioxide. One possibility is deep sea disposal-dissolving the gas in sea-water at high pressure. However, the effect on ocean dynamics has not been modeled yet. Another possibility is to pump the carbon dioxide back into the ground, especially into old oil and gas fields. The heavier gas would tend to displace dissolved methane and thus increase the output of natural gas, at least slightly. Presumably, very little-if any-of the carbon dioxide would ever reappear at the surface. Both of these schemes would involve long-distance transportation on a rather large scale, mostly likely by pipeline or ship. The costs would be quite large for power plants far from an oil or gas field, or from deep water. A third possibility is to find a way of utilizing pure (or nearly pure) carbon dioxide in some useful and long-lived product, almost certainly a construction material of some sort. This idea seems far-fetched, but researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory, among others, are working on it.
Toward a Hydrogen Economy
Throughout the stationary (non-transportation) world, energy delivered to the final point of use is increasingly in the form of electricity. This trend is expected to continue. However, storage difficulties do seem to restrict the long-term potential for use in vehicles. At present, there is no realistic substitute for liquid hydrocarbons as fuels for mobile power sources. Nevertheless, there is increasing interest in another possibility-hydrogen. For many years, hydrogen was thought to be too dangerous to use in vehicles, perhaps in part because of the famous Hindenburg fire back in 1937. However cooler heads and recent research suggest that safe methods of storage, even in small quantities, are possible. Indeed, there may be an analogy with past experience with steam engines. Accidents were common (and often fatal) in the early days when the boiler was essentially a large teakettle, and when a leak could result in an explosion. The invention that made explosions impossible was the so-called monotube boiler-essentially a long tube inside a tank. There is no reason the same idea couldn't be applied to compressed hydrogen storage, perhaps on a microscopic scale (nanotubes).
Fuel cells have emerged, since the 1980s, as the great hope for a new generation of vehicular power plants. The big breakthrough was the development of a plastic membrane that allows protons (ionized hydrogen atoms) to pass through while blocking the passage of electrons.2 This makes it possible to accumulate negatively charged electrons on one side of the membrane and positively charged protons on the other, creating a voltage difference. The availability of this material has enabled the development of the so-called proton-exchange-membrane (PEM) fuel cells, which are the basis of the most active current research programs, especially by Ballard Power Systems Inc. However, these cells also depend upon the availability of hydrogen as a fuel, and platinum as a catalyst. To be sure, the amount of platinum required has been cut dramatically since the first prototypes, but it cannot be eliminated altogether. (Unfortunately, the less platinum is used per cell, the more uneconomic it is to recycle.) But platinum is an extremely scarce metal, and it is doubtful whether there is enough to support a whole new energy economy.
There are, however, a number of other types of fuel cells. Some are suitable for use in buildings, where both heat and power are needed. The most advanced is the phosphoric acid cell. Another possibility suitable for buildings is the high-temperature molten carbonate fuel cell. This can be paired with small gas turbines, using the waste heat. Composite efficiencies of 60 percent are possible. Several other types of cells are also attracting interest. And recent research has overcome some of the barriers that formerly seemed to block progress.3
Owning Your Share of CO2
The usual policy prescriptions for cutting greenhouses gases include eliminating direct or indirect subsidies to fossil fuels, setting efficiency standards (such as CAFE), directly regulating emissions, and taxing emissions. Carbon taxes to reduce consumption are being seriously considered in the European Union.
I would like to propose something more radical: a system whereby every legal resident over some minimum age receives a fixed carbon entitlement, based on the annual quota for the country as determined by international negotiation along Kyoto lines. This entitlement is equal for all legal residents over the minimum age, and it is recorded in a bank account. Parents of eligible children have control of their children's entitlements. The entitlements are tradeable, and have a market value. They can be bought and sold for money.
Here is how the scheme would work. Every time an individual makes a direct purchase of a carbonaceous fuel-say gasoline for the car-his or her carbon entitlement account is debited by the appropriate amount of carbon, as well as by the money price. The system works exactly the same way as a debit (money) card works today, except that there is a parallel unit of account in kilograms of carbon. Surplus individual entitlement units can be sold. The sale would be done through the bank where the account is held, at the prevailing market price, and the money value of the entitlement units sold would be deposited in the customer's money account at the same bank.
In this system, there are no automatic entitlements for businesses or other organizations. Unlike the widely discussed idea of CO2 permit trading, it does not "grandfather" allocations to existing corporations; it requires those corporations to pay their way like everyone else. If a shop or a manufacturing firm needs to buy fuel it must use entitlements purchased in the market. This cost will, of course, add to the price of the goods or services being produced. The added cost is passed back to consumers, just as a carbon tax or a value-added tax is passed back. Thus, individuals pay indirectly for their carbon use, through higher prices for goods and services. Needless to say, energy-intensive services rise in price more than energy-conserving goods and services.
On average, people would receive a net income from the sale of surplus entitlements to finance the extra costs they have to pay. But low-income people with low levels of material consumption would gain from the scheme. Elderly stay-at-homes and bicycle-riding students would receive extra money from the sale of unused entitlements. They would receive more from the sale of surplus entitlements than they would have to pay in extra costs, amounting to a real income supplement. But for high-income people with high levels of material consumption-people with big display houses who drive SUVs towing large power boats, for instance-there would be an additional cost to buy the extra carbon units they consume.
The advantages of this scheme over a simple, uniform carbon tax are several. First, the level of the "tax" (i.e., the price of entitlements) would not be determined by politicians, but by the free market. Only the amount of carbon consumption (and emissions) to be allowed in that year would be fixed by government. Second, the scheme would explicitly recognize that rights to carbon consumption cannot be unlimited, and that as a limited resource they ought to be allocated equally to everyone. If politicians chose to award free consumption rights to certain favored users (say farmers) it would have to be done and defended openly. Third, and most important, the scheme would hit the wasters hardest and reward the conservers.
A Critical Consideration
A key point of this discussion is that economic growth in the long run depends upon continued technological innovation, not just marginal improvements in existing technologies. The potential for marginal improvements in any technology is always declining. For example, internal combustion engines improved dramatically in the half-century from 1876 to 1926. From 1926 to 1976, further gains were minor at best. Only radical changes can keep the forward momentum going. The fuel cell would be such a radical change.
But although giant companies dominate the economy, radical changes are rarely initiated by big firms. For example, the modern developments in fuel cell technology came from a small firm, Ballard Power Systems Inc. even though most of the basic research had previously been done by General Electric. Why didn't GE follow through? The short answer is that radical changes are disruptive, and big firms hate uncertainty. They are happy and profitable as long as things stay as they are. In a new ball game anything can happen. Today's profitable product can be an obsolete loser tomorrow. So, corporate giants are generally risk-averse. This does not prevent them from doing important basic research from time to time. Bell Laboratories invented the transistor, for example. But others, like the upstart Texas Instruments, exploited it. Hewlett-Packard and Xerox invented several important technologies underlying the PC. But Apple exploited them.
Small firms have different motivations. As long as things stay as they are, small firms remain small. In fact, they have trouble surviving against larger competitors. In order to survive and become more profitable they must get big, and that means taking market share away from some existing big firm, or-better yet-inventing a new market. Either way involves big risks. Most small firms that take big risks will fail. That is the way of the world. But when a risky venture succeeds, the payoff can be very big indeed. Most of today's big companies got that way by taking risks they would not take now.
The point I am making is that the Bush Administration is protecting the dinosaurs against the risk-takers. But then, it is the dinosaurs who can afford to make big campaign contributions.
One last but most important point: those who resist any challenge to the fossil fuel economy claim that government intervention invariably inhibits economic growth. My claim is almost exactly opposite, and it is based on the real technological history of the past century: many of the most important technologies of our age came into being only because of government intervention. This is not to deny that government-operated services tend to be inefficient. But consider a few examples related to energy: the railroads across the western plains were built by private enterprise but only because of large land grants (subsidies) from the government. The U.S. interstate highway system was a tax-supported federal project. Large civil jet aircraft depend on engines (and many other technologies) that were developed originally for military (government) purposes. The air traffic control system is still operated by the government. The big hydroelectric dams that provide both irrigation and electric power to several important areas were government-funded. Nuclear power was entirely based on reactor designs and fuels developed for nuclear weapons. In fact, the nuclear power industry still depends on a liability exemption mandated by congress. (You can't sue for damages in case of a nuclear accident.)
The Department of Energy supports extensive R&D programs in nuclear technology (including fusion power) and in several fossil-fuel related areas such as "clean coal." The government subsidizes Midwestern corn growers and grain processors to produce ethanol as a fuel. Why, then, is the U.S. administration so reluctant to support the really important new technologies like wind power, solar power and-above all, conservation-that could make the biggest difference?
Robert U. Ayres was Professor of Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie-Mellon University from 1979 to 1992, then moved to the European business school INSEAD, in France, where he is now Emeritus Professor of Environment and Management.