This article uses data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to estimate the independent and interactive effects of income, family structure, and maternal work on measures of substandard parenting. Results from child fixed‐effects analyses suggest that children in mother‐partner families are more likely to be exposed to substandard parenting than children in mother‐father families. However, income plays a particularly strong protective role in regard to substandard parenting in mother‐partner families, such that parenting improves as income rises. Increases in maternal work hours are associated with increases in substandard parenting for children in single‐mother families.