Purpose: The Bush Administration has spoken of an ‘ownership society' in America, recognizing wealth as a springboard of opportunity for families. Wealth is a meaningful gauge of well-being, as it may be used for daily survival, as well as for investment toward future economic opportunity across generations. Individuals who own wealth fare better in measures of health, mental health, educational attainment, and other welfare indicators. Unfortunately, studies have shown women in general, and single women in particular are less able to accumulate wealth than men. Women of minority status are even less able to accumulate wealth. Research has identified some of the mechanisms preventing women from gaining equality in wealth accumulation, including pay differentials in the labor market, post-marital financial decline, and ascribed socio-domestic maternal roles. It is this last factor, the maternal role, which may have the largest impact on a woman's ability to generate wealth. This study explores the ability of female household heads to acquire and command wealth, comparing households with children to childless households.

Methods: Drawing a sample of 8,464 female household heads from the 1996 Survey of Income and Program Participation panel (Wave 3), we examine asset ownership and value in three basic categories: home ownership, interest-bearing assets, and vehicle ownership, comparing female household heads with children to those without children, controlling for ethnicity, marital status, education, income, and age. Each of the asset categories are modeled using the Heckman two-stage procedure, in which estimation of the second (value) equation is conditional on answering “yes” to the first (holding) equation. In each, the first (holding) equation is estimated using probit analysis. For home and vehicle equity, where negative values are possible, the second (value) equations are estimated using ordinary least squares regression. Due to skewness, the values of interest-earning assets (where negative values are not possible) are transformed by taking logarithms before estimation.

Results: We find women with children were much less likely than childless women to work full-time, hold post-secondary degree, and have household income above the poverty line. Controlling for these differences, the presence of children reduces the probability of holding an interest-bearing asset (from 51.6% for childless women to 39.2% for women with children) but has no effect on the probability of home or vehicle ownership. Children do significantly impact home equity ($8,428 lower on average), value of interest-bearing assets ($804 lower), and vehicle equity ($851 lower). Factors such as ethnicity, age, post-marital status, and presence of another female adult in the home also affected the probability of owning assets.

Implications: Using our results, social work practitioners are charged to acquire financial training skills for clients. Other studies have indicated low-income families, most headed by single females, would benefit from learning how to acquire and manage wealth. Additionally, social workers need to advocate to change social policy so single female household heads are enabled to accumulate assets. Finally, further research is needed to explore how assets affect single female headed households.