Welfare receipt and family structure: evaluating the effects on children's reading achievement

This paper examines the impact of public and private support system on cognitive outcomes for children born to adolescent mothers. The data for this analysis were drawn from the 1979 to 1988 rounds of the National Longitudinal Surrey of Youth between the ages of six and ten in 1988. The key inputs for this analysis are four indicators of private support: average family income, extensiveness of mother's employment, presence of grandparents and presence of a significant other. Additionally, I use one indicator of public support: average number of survey years that the family received welfare benefits. All five indicators are averaged over the life span of the child. I also control for maternal resources - intellectual skills and self-esteem.