Marriage proves to be an excellent way to keep children from growing up in poverty.
That conclusion was reached through a study done by The Heritage Foundation. Spokesman Robert Rector tells OneNewsNow a child's probability of growing up in poverty is reduced by 82 percent when the parents are married.
"If you look nationwide, in a given year about 37 percent of the single-parent families with children are poor," he says. "By contrast, of the married two-parent families, only 7 percent of them are poor. And you know what? That reduction occurs even if you make a comparison between parents at the same education level."
Rector points out that what the mainstream press in America never acknowledges is that with 70 percent of the poverty in America occurring in single-parent families, marriage is a key solution to poverty.
"It's actually a stronger factor than graduating from high school," he adds. "Now, I'm not suggesting that people should drop out of high school -- [finishing high school is] clearly a very positive thing. But the fact of the matter is that marriage is actually more powerful in terms of its social and economic outcomes, and no one talks about it. It's a big secret."
Rector says the experts on the subject know it, but there "really has been a gag rule on talking about the benign effects of marriage in the United States for decades."