Krauthammer: High Out-of-Wedlock Birth Rate a 'Catastrophe'

Conservative pundit and psychiatrist Charles Krauthammer says the exploding out-of-wedlock birthrate has been a "catastrophe" on society.

Responding to a new Pew Research Center study that found only 46 percent of children are being raised in a family with two heterosexual parents in their first marriage, Krauthammer said Thursday on Fox News Channel's "The O'Reilly Factor" that a child born to a single mother faces not only poverty, but disadvantages in education, discipline, and socialization.

Out-of-wedlock births were at 5 percent in 1960 and now are 41 percent. Krauthammer said the major reason for the explosion is not lack of birth control, but the lack of stigma that was once attached to what were then called "illegitimate" births.

People want to be humane and sympathetic to an individual in the situation, but when expanded societywide, the lack of stigma is harmful, he said.

"It's like food stamps," Krauthammer said. "For an individual who is hungry it’s a good thing. For society in general when you're at 50, 60 million [people] on food stamps, it's a bad thing."

"It's a dilemma to figure out" whether out-of-wedlock births should be stigmatized, Krauthammer admitted, but added, "the normalization of illegitimacy has been a catastrophe for society. And we're going to suffer the consequences."

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