New Data Show Fewer People Living Alone
Is living alone passe?</br></br>That's what the latest annual statistics on U.S. households suggest.</br></br>For the first time since the mid-1960s, the growth in non-family households -- mainly singles -- came to a virtual halt this year, according to the U.S. Census Bureau's latest Current Population Survey. In the 1970s, the number of such households soared 77.7%, five times the rise in family households.</br></br>"It's pretty amazing," says Peter Francese, president of American Demographics magazine. "Most demographic trends don't disappear that quickly."</br></br>One year's statistic doesn't always portend a trend, and young adults are still much more likely to live alone today than they were a generation ago. Still, the rise in single-member households has been slowing since the early 1980s, when there was a recession. That's when many newly jobless young adults moved back with Mom and Dad.