Educated men become fathers earlier and spend more time with kids

Nearly half of U.S. men without a high school education have fathered a child outside of marriage, compared to about 6 percent of college graduates, according to a survey released on Wednesday.

Photo: Educated men become fathers earlier and spend more time with kids

The survey, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics includes detailed information on sex, marriage and parenthood from young men for the first time.

It finds that 47 percent of men and 58 percent of women aged 15 to 44 have ever had a child, inside or outside marriage, informs Reuters.

"Education is a big driving factor for a lot of the results in this survey," Gladys Martinez, the CDC demographer who led the study, said in an interview. "When you get higher education, you're more focused on that, so you're waiting to do other things."

The report also found disparities in when men of different races have children. About 25 percent of black fathers had their first child before age 20, compared with 19 percent of Hispanic fathers and 11 percent of whites. About 37 percent of black men were married when their first child was born, compared with 52 percent for Hispanic men and 77 percent for white men, according to the study.

People who got married later were more likely to stay together, with about half of the men who married as teenagers getting divorced or separated within 10 years compared with 17 percent of men who married at age 26 or older, according to the study, reports Houston Chronicle.

According to Forbes, one expert thinks that the report paints a positive picture, but added that dads still need support, especially those in lower-income brackets.

"This is a very optimistic picture of the role of dads and fatherhood in America," said Shelley Waters Boots, vice president for policy and programs at the Washington, D.C.-based Parents Action for Children. "It is quite affirming that a lot of dads are doing a lot of the work of parenting," she added.

"In America, we don't give parents credit for how hard it is, and how hard it is to do it well," Waters Boots said. "So, if you have higher income and more flexibility, you see dads really step up to the plate. For dads who are really struggling to bring home the paycheck, they are paying a price of not doing the parenting job they want to do. We need to be giving dads more support," she said.