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slated into job loss, declining wage growth, dwindling state income support, rising health care costs, and mounting living costs for many low-income households, especially single-mothers (Hartmann 2008; Bakker 2003). Studies have shown that if differences in wealth are explored by marital status, gender, and parenting, single mothers suffer the most severe economic penalties in household wealth accumulation (Yamokoski and Keister (2007). The role of motherhood has been cited as the primary factor in affecting poverty rates for single mothers. Nancy Folbre (1987) has called this the ‘pauperization of motherhood’, suggesting that the reduction in welfare services and the stagnation in wages has penalized mothers. As a result parenthood has left single-mothers poorer than fathers. In addition, gender norms and racial stereotypes which are embedded in political, legal, economic and financial domains perpetuate the stratified gender and racial systems. As such, gender (and racial) ideologies are used to justify the existing gender/racial imbalance in power and resources (Seguino 2007). This paper builds and expands on the social stratification and wealth (asset) accumulation literature (Yamokoski and Keister 2006; Schmidt and Seval 2006; Deere and Doss 2006; Folbre 1987; Seguino 2007), but here we assess these trends in terms of single female-headed households and their increasing mortgage indebtedness relative to wages. We analyze the different relative financial insecurity of women in partnership with financial dependent children, single-mothers, and minority single-mothers by evaluating their income levels relative to outstanding debts. We use the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) to demonstrate how these trends are reflected in mounting debt levels and crippling costs of servicing these debts compared to relatively flat income growth levels for female-headed households, specifically single mothers, and African American single mothers. In doing so, we elucidate how different women were affected by the subprime boom in different, arguably more pernicious, ways. This research builds on the existing evidence showing that subprime lending was disproportionally sold to women, particularly minority women while at the same time creating huge profit opportunities for banks and wealth holders. Most perniciously for wealth (dis)accumulation was the fact, that the previously unbanked and underbanked households extracted housing wealth to adjust to shrinking purchasing power (Dymski 2009). While we do not measure wealth accumulation per se, we use mortgage debt as a proxy for arguing that low-income women own a lesser share of their homes – (dis)accumulation of wealth – relative to their income. As long as house prices increased, equity withdrawal made it possible for many single female headed households to finance current consumption. The opposite is now true – the sharp drop in house prices and the riskier subprime loans have led to a higher proportion of foreclosures among subprime borrowers.

The Myth of Inclusion and the Politics of Subprime Lending

Gendering Financialization

The Family Dynamics of Indebtedness

Conclusion 总结

Contrary to the expectations of the ownership society, the subprime strategy turned out to be a major source in wealth (dis)accumulation for many single female-headed households, in particular for African-American households. Ther