The Negative Effects of Teen Pregnancy

There are different effects on teenage mothers than there is on teenage fathers. Mothers lose more friends and are looked at way differently; fathers keep most of their friends without too many people having an opinion about him. After the mother has her baby, she can’t go back to school, so she has to be put on homebound. The father can go to school, can play sports, and can have fun with his friends. Both the mother and the father have responsibility, but the mother has to do more, like work to make money for the child, take care of the child, and still go to school. The father still has to do the same, just not as much work. The mother will always be in the child’s life, but most teenage fathers will not be in there child’s life.
Teen pregnancy is a major social and public health problem in the U.S. Teens have the highest pregnancy rate in the industrial world; 82 percent of the pregnancies were unplanned. Teenagers become pregnant at twice the rate of teens in other industrial countries, including England, Canada, and Wales. The Guttmacher Institute reports that 750,000 teenagers 15 to 19 become pregnant each year. Teen pregnancies are tied to poverty, academic failure, child abuse and neglect crime and other social health related problems (Spencer 1).
Most of the teen pregnancies focus is on the mother but fathers are also affected. Amy Williams executive director of the Teenage Pregnancy and parenting project says in a 2005 Time magazine article that "Teen fathers frequently feel they have to get a job and drop out of school and get a job." Teen fathers earn less over time than men who have children at an older age. Teen fathers earn 10 to 15 percent less annually than male teens that wait to have children. Besides earning less than men who wait to father children, teen fathers are required to pay child support until the child is 18. According to the report "Adolescent Pregnancy and Childbearing in California" only one in five teen mothers receives child