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-- Programs and Services -- Contact Information Grandparents Day is September 11, 2005
Did you know....?
Grandparents Day was the brainchild of Marian McQuade of Fayette County, W.Va., who hoped to persuade grandchildren to tap the wisdom and heritage of their grandparents. The first presidential proclamation was issued in 1978, and one has been issued each year since then designating the first Sunday after Labor Day as National Grandparents Day.
Caregivers
• There are 5.7 million grandparents in the United States living with one or more of their grandchildren under the age of 18. Seventy-nine percent of these grandparents (4.5 million) maintain their own households.
• Of these 4.5 million grandparents, 2.4 million are responsible for most of the basic needs (i.e., food, shelter, clothing) of one or more of the grandchildren with whom they live. These grandparents represent 42 percent of all grandparents who live with their grandchildren. Of these caregivers, 1.5 million are grandmothers and 900,000, grandfathers. For some grandparents the caregiving is of short duration, but 900,000 will be responsible for most of the basic needs of their grandchildren for at least five years.
• Most of the grandparents raising grandchildren are retired, but 1.4 million of them are still in the labor force and simultaneously responsible for most of the basic needs of their grandchildren.
Multigenerational families
• There are 3.9 million multigenerational family households in the United States, where grandparents live under the same roof with two or more generations of descendants. They represent 4 percent of all households.
• In 65%, or 2.6 million, of these households, the grandparent is the head of household and shares living space with his or her children and their children, while in 33%of these households, grandparents live in their children’s homes (or those of their son or daughter-in-law) along with their children’s children. These households number 1.3 million.
Grandchildren
• In the United States, 5.6 million children live with a grandparent; these children comprise 8 percent of all children in the United States. Of these children, 3.7 million live in their grandparent’s home and 1.8 million in the home of their parents.
• Some 21 percent of all preschoolers are cared for primarily by their grandparents while their mother or father is employed or in school.