Coresidence with Parents and the Well-Being of Single Mothers in Japan

James Raymo, University of Wisconsin at Madison
Yanfei Zhou, The Japan Institute for Labour Policy and Training (JILPT)

The goal of this paper is to evaluate the extent to which the well-being of single-mothers in Japan is related to intergenerational coresidence and the receipt of economic and instrumental support from non-coresident parents. We use data from a recent survey of single mothers to examine three measures of well-being: self-rated health, subjective economic well-being, and educational expenditures on children. One-fourth of the single mothers surveyed were coresiding with parents and initial tabulations indicate that these women fare significantly better than their independent-living counterparts on all three measures of well-being. Tabulations by whether mothers were receiving support from non-coresidential parents suggest that single mothers living apart from parents are a heterogeneous group. Those who are not receiving support from parents appear to be similar to coresident women whereas non-coresident single mothers receiving support from parents have significantly lower levels of well-being.