Volume 7 - Article 17 | Pages 565–592
A comparative analysis of leaving home in the United States, the Netherlands and West Germany
By Clara Mulder, William A.V. Clark, Michael Wagner
Abstract
We investigate how leaving the parental home differs between three countries with different welfare-state and housing systems: the USA, the Netherlands and West Germany. Using longitudinal survey data, we examine the transitions of leaving home to live with and without a partner.
We find that, much more than in the European countries, union formation has become separated from leaving home in the USA. We also find a different impact of level of education and employment status on leaving-home patterns in the European countries with their social-welfare state system than in the US system in which market forces prevail. The differences are not just related to welfare-state systems but also to the sizes of the countries and the geographical dispersion of jobs and educational opportunities.
Author's Affiliation
- Clara Mulder - Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, the Netherlands EMAIL
- William A.V. Clark - University of California, Los Angeles, United States of America EMAIL
- Michael Wagner - Universität zu Köln, Germany EMAIL
Other articles by the same author/authors in Demographic Research
LAT relationships: A new living arrangement among the oldest old population in Germany?
Volume 44 - Article 14
Transitions to partnership and parenthood: Is China still traditional?
Volume 43 - Article 6
Introduction to the special collection on life course decisions of families in China
Volume 43 - Article 5
Nonresident family as a motive for migration
Volume 42 - Article 13
Separation, divorce, and housing tenure: A cross-country comparison
Volume 41 - Article 39
Running out of time? Understanding the consequences of the biological clock for the dynamics of fertility intentions and union formation
Volume 40 - Article 1
Putting family centre stage: Ties to nonresident family, internal migration, and immobility
Volume 39 - Article 43
Differences in leaving home by individual and parental education among young adults in Europe
Volume 37 - Article 63
Loss aversion and duration of residence
Volume 35 - Article 36
Union dissolution and migration
Volume 34 - Article 26
Family dynamics and housing: Conceptual issues and empirical findings
Volume 29 - Article 14
Do women delay family formation in expensive housing markets?
Volume 27 - Article 1
On the links between employment, partnership quality, and the desire to have a first child: The case of West Germany
Volume 24 - Article 24
Geographical distances between adult children and their parents in the Netherlands
Volume 17 - Article 22
Family migration and mobility sequences in the United States: Spatial mobility in the context of the life course
Volume 17 - Article 20
Population and housing: A two-sided relationship
Volume 15 - Article 13
Most recent similar articles in Demographic Research
Left behind single in the partnering market? Entry into cohabiting unions by women and men with low educational attainment across regions of Europe, cohorts 1960 to 1985
Volume 51 - Article 43
| Keywords:
cohabitation,
education,
Europe,
European Social Survey,
event history analysis,
logistic regression,
marginalization,
partner selection,
singlehood,
union formation
The division of housework and childcare from a dyadic perspective: Discrepancies between partners’ reports across the transition to parenthood
Volume 51 - Article 30
| Keywords:
division of labor,
dyadic data,
Germany,
informant discrepancy,
transition to parenthood
Higher incomes are increasingly associated with higher fertility: Evidence from the Netherlands, 2008–2022
Volume 51 - Article 26
| Keywords:
fertility,
income,
inequalities,
Netherlands,
parenthood
Decomposition analysis of disparities in infant mortality rates across 27 US states
Volume 50 - Article 40
| Keywords:
decomposition,
health disparities,
infant mortality,
United States of America
Leaving and returning to the parental home during COVID times in France, Italy, Germany, Spain, and the United Kingdom
Volume 50 - Article 3
| Keywords:
behavior,
COVID-19,
intentions,
leaving the parental home,
motivations
Download to Citation Manager
PubMed
Google Scholar