The U.S. birthrate fell again in 2018, to 3,788,235 births — representing a 2% drop from 2017. It’s the lowest number of births in 32 years, according to a new federal report. The numbers also sank the U.S. fertility rate to a record low.
Not since 1986 has the U.S. seen so few babies born. And it’s an ongoing slump: 2018 was the fourth consecutive year of birth declines, according to the provisional birthrate report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Birthrates fell for nearly all racial and age groups, with only slight gains for women in their late 30s and early 40s, the CDC says.
The news has come as something of a surprise to demographers who say that with the U.S. economy and job market continuing a years-long growth streak, they had expected the birthrate to show signs of stabilizing, or even rising. But instead, the drop could force changes to forecasts about how the country will look — with an older population and fewer young workers to sustain key social systems.
“It’s a national problem,” says Dowell Myers, a demographer at the University of Southern California.
“The birthrate is a barometer of despair,” Myers says in response to the CDC data. Explaining that idea, he says young people won’t make plans to have babies unless they’re optimistic about the future.
Full story at NPR.org.
Birthrate is not a barometer of dispair. It has been known for decades that birthrate is inversely correlated with economic prosperity. Poorer countries have higher birthrates than developed economies. The reason the US has outpaced Wester Europe economically in the last 30 years, even though we’ve had similar birthrates, is that the US had higher rates of immigration. Guess what: with Trump etc., that has flipped. We now are headed into a declining population and therefore a declining economy.
I don’t think it is a barometer of despair. I think people are on their phones and laptops and not really living full lives anymore.. I think the desire for children has diminished. Parenthood is hard and people don’t want the burden. Also, women who have careers don’t want kids until they are older. Fewer people marry, and while the stigma of out of wedlock births is gone, single parenthood is still not what most people want.
How many of these children will be baptized?
It is obvious, our culture has collapsed– the “post-modern,” “post-Christian” “Culture of Death” has replaced it. But all things do pass! The “Culture of Life” is slowly coming to pass, by the working of God!
It is obvious, our culture has collapsed– the “post-modern,” “post-Christian” “Culture of Death” has replaced it. But all things do pass! The “Culture of Life” is slowly emerging, by the hand of God!