A number of women who put off having babies after the 2007-09 recession are forgoing them altogether; more educated women and student debt also contribute to decline in birth rates

See U.S. Births Hit Lowest Number Since 1987: Last year’s fertility-rate drop was the largest one-year decline since 2010 by Janet Adamy of The WSJ.

"American women are having children at the lowest rate on record, with the number of babies born in the U.S. last year dropping to a 30-year low, federal figures released Thursday showed.

Some 3.85 million babies were born last year, down 2% from 2016 and the lowest number since 1987, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics. The general fertility rate for women age 15 to 44 was 60.2 births per 1,000 women—the lowest rate since the government began tracking it more than a century ago, said Brady Hamilton, a statistician at the center.

The figures suggest that a number of women who put off having babies after the 2007-09 recession are forgoing them altogether. Kenneth M. Johnson, senior demographer at the University of New Hampshire, estimates 4.8 million fewer babies were born after the recession than would have been born had fertility rates stayed at prerecession levels."

"The postrecession baby lull appeared to be ending when births ticked up in 2014. But they’ve now fallen for three straight years, and last year’s fertility-rate drop was the largest one-year decline since 2010."

"One bright spot in Thursday’s figures, which are preliminary, is a continued sharp decline in teen births, which fell 7% last year. Since 2007, the teen birthrate has declined by 55%, and is down 70% since its peak in 1991. Children born to adolescents are more likely to have poorer educational, behavioral and health outcomes throughout their life."

"lower teen fertility accounts for about one-third of the overall decline in births among U.S. women.

The increase in women attending college is another force behind the birth decline, researchers say. Those with more skills face a greater trade-off if they interrupt their careers to have children.

“People are coming out with a lot of debt,” said Jennie Brand, professor of sociology and statistics at UCLA who has studied the impact of education on fertility. That gives them an incentive to keep working. “It’s another thing they have to grapple with before they might think about starting a family.”"

Related posts:

The Economy Affects The Birth Rate (2010)

Did The Recession Help Lower The Birth Rate? (2011)

U.S. Fertility Rate Hits Lowest Level on Record (2012)