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Families in an Era of Increasing Inequality pp 35–49Cite as

Diverging Destinies in Rural America

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Part of the book series: National Symposium on Family Issues ((NSFI,volume 5))

Abstract

This chapter extends McClanahan and Jacobsen’s (Chap. 1) arguments to rural America with an emphasis on better understanding the converging downward destinies of women without a high-school education and those with a high school education in contrast to the increased gains in wealth and life circumstances of college-educated women. We examine how the 24-h economy has transformed the lives of less-educated women with more and more of them working nonstandard hours in rural America in comparison with college-educated women who work very few nonstandard hours. The impact on family life is explored using the Family Life Project , a representative sample of rural children followed since birth . Data suggest that parenting , including parental talk to children, is similar and much lower for women who have less than a college degree in comparison with the higher levels of parenting and talk to children for the college-educated mothers.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Education, The University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, USA

    Lynne Vernon-Feagans

  2. Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, USA

    Margaret Burchinal & Irina Mokrova

Authors
  1. Lynne Vernon-Feagans
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  2. Margaret Burchinal
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  3. Irina Mokrova
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lynne Vernon-Feagans .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Sociology and Criminology, The Pennsylvania State Univeristy, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA

    Paul R. Amato

  2. Department of Sociology and Criminology, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA

    Alan Booth

  3. Social Science Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA

    Susan M. McHale

  4. Population Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, USA

    Jennifer Van Hook

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© 2015 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

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Vernon-Feagans, L., Burchinal, M., Mokrova, I. (2015). Diverging Destinies in Rural America. In: Amato, P., Booth, A., McHale, S., Van Hook, J. (eds) Families in an Era of Increasing Inequality. National Symposium on Family Issues, vol 5. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-08308-7_3

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