High U.S. Fertility Rate Unusual Among Industrialized Countries, Opinion Piece Says

Main Category: Fertility
Also Included In: Pediatrics / Children's Health;  Women's Health / Gynecology;  Pregnancy / Obstetrics
Article Date: 08 May 2009 - 1:00 PST

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While the popularity of television reality shows focused on large families prove that "babies dominate pop culture these days," high birth rates also "are dominating the real world," USA Today contributor and author Laura Vanderkam writes in an opinion piece. Vanderkam adds that a recent National Center for Health Statistics report found that U.S. fertility rates in 2007 reached 2.12 lifetime births per woman, an increase from 2006 rates and a significant change from 1.74 births per woman in 1976. According to Vanderkam, although the current recession could shift the trend, "annual changes are less important" than the "long-term reality" that the U.S. is one of few industrialized nations to have a fertility rate above the replacement level of 2.1.

Vanderkam continues that demographers offer several reasons for the "exceptionality" of U.S. fertility rates, including the country's "lamentably high teen pregnancy rate" and the "many unplanned pregnancies among grown-ups who should know better." However, "accidents don't explain everything," Vanderkam writes, noting that although many young women in industrialized countries "say they want two kids," the "average woman" in the U.S. "is quite likely to hit that -- and sometimes go over." She continues that compared with countries such as Japan -- which has a fertility rate of 1.2 -- "even getting the bulk of families to the desired two kids is noteworthy." She writes, "What's most fascinating is that the [U.S.] has managed to do this even as the majority of women work outside the home." According to Vanderkam, the U.S. fertility rate increased by 22% between 1976 and 2007, while women's workforce participation rate increased by about 25% during the same period. "In other words, for all the cultural angst about work-life balance, the numbers show that, increasingly, women think they can manage jobs and families," Vanderkam writes.

According to Vanderkam, high birth rates are not "just about individual choices;" there also are policy implications. For instance, if fewer people in the workforce contribute to Social Security, the system "will exhaust its trust fund about 2041," a problem that a higher birth rate could lessen, Vanderkam says. She continues that "given our recent fiscal policies, there's a case to be made that not only is a high birth rate a good sign, we should be hoping it rises at least a bit more." According to Vanderkam, a "baby bulge over the next few years could push off the day of reckoning, and the economic growth a rising population causes will shrink our debt to a more manageable percentage of GDP." She concludes that U.S. birth rates "suggest that maybe our looming fiscal problems won't turn out as badly as things look right now" (Vanderkam, USA Today, 5/6).

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