Introduction

Over the last decades major economic and sociodemographic changes have shaken the Fordist order, creating new risks and new needs. On the sociodemographic side, the increase in women’s participation in the labour market, together with the rise of divorces and out-of-wedlock births has made the ‘male breadwinner family’ no longer pre-eminent. On the economic side, the emergence of skill-intensive technological change and deindustrialisation have reduced the demand for lower-skilled workers, contributing to an increase in structural unemployment and in inequality in the distribution of wages and earnings (Danziger et al, 1995; OECD, 1994, 1995). In other words, the ability of the male breadwinner to maintain the whole family has been weakened. As a consequence of these changes, the risk of poverty has increasingly threatened the workingage population, and in turn, children. Particularly vulnerable are children living in families headed by single mothers and those headed by two adults with limited job skills (Palmer et al, 1988; McFate et al, 1995).

Despite the fact that these economic and demographic changes have affected in a similar way all advanced countries, leading to a common set of risks, poverty among two-parent and one-parent families varies considerably. This variation raises questions about the role of public policies, particularly of social sciences. How have the different countries respponded to these new family poverty risks in the area of social policy? Which dimensions and types of social policy are more effective in facing these risks? In the political and scientific debate the attention has been traditionally placed on income transfers. As Gornick et al point out (1997), much less appreciated is the anti-poverty role of policies that support mothers’ employment. Yet, evidence shows that the well-being of families is strongly connected with the position of mothers in the labour market. Everywhere two-earner couples with children and oneparent working families are less likely to be poor compared to singleearner couples and lone mothers on social assistance (Förster, 1994). Indeed mothers’ earnings are an important shelter from poverty. First, given the rise in unemployment and the rising inequality in earnings’ distribution, mothers’ earnings have become relevant in case of fathers’ unemployment or low wages. Second, mothers’ earnings are extremely important as ‘divorce insurance’.