The stereotype of a single mom is a teenager. She and her boyfriend have had an accidental pregnancy and are not prepared to be parents. That stereotype isn’t all wrong. A large fraction (37 percent) of single mothers started their childbearing in this way. A slightly older group of young women in their early to mid-twenties are also drifting into single parenthood accidentally. The result: fully 60 percent of all births to unmarried women under the age of 30 are unplanned, and close to half of their kids will grow up in poverty.

But there is a new and growing category of unmarried parents: single mothers by choice. They are women who have thought hard about whether to have (or adopt) a child and have made a careful decision to do so. Unlike those who drift into parenthood unintentionally, they are likely to be much better prepared to raise a child. They are not only older, but better-educated and more financially prepared to take on the task. Call them the true super moms of the family story.

A growing group?

Between 2002 and 2012, unwed pregnancy rates plunged among teens and even declined a bit among women in their twenties — but rose among older women, most especially those over 30.