The Birth Dearth Is About Values, Not Economics By Star Parker for CNS News
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that births in the USA reached another historic low in 2020.
For the sixth consecutive year, the birth rate dropped — this time by 4%. The average annual drop in the five previous years was 2%.
The rate at which American women are having babies is way below the rate necessary to keep the population steady-state — that is, for the population not to shrink.
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A steady-state population requires a total fertility rate of 2.1 children per woman. In 2020, it was 1.64.
Needless to say, for politicians, there is no problem that does not have a government solution, and the birth dearth is no exception.
Both President Joe Biden and Sen. Mitt Romney have plans for bolstering American families. The president’s American Families Plan proposes to spend a modest $1.8 trillion. Romney is pitching his Family Security Act, which proposes per-child government payments up to $1,250 per family per month.
Romney writes in The Wall Street Journal, “Young people are marrying less and having fewer kids in part because they don’t feel confident about their job prospects and financial security.”
But if less marriage and fewer children are the result of today’s economic stress, why is it that in 1960, the fertility rate was 3.58 — more than double today’s 1.64 — yet today’s real per capita income, per the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, is over three times higher than it was in 1960?
According to the Institute for Family Studies, in 2018, 35% of Americans ages 25 to 50 had never been married. In 1970, only 9% in this age range had never been married.
Is this because times got harder? I don’t think so. Per capita income in 2018 was 2.4 times higher than it was in 1970.
I don’t think our young people are avoiding marriage and children because of concerns about financial security.
I think they are avoiding marriage and children because they don’t want marriage and children.
