COVID-19 has impacted essentially every aspect of American life, including women’s plans for starting or growing their families. The COVID Family Survey, conducted by Demographic Intelligence, finds that the pandemic has led about 3% of U.S. women who were considering have children to delay their plans to have a baby. In some cases, they are [...]
Child populations are declining nationally and in most U.S. states. Particularly deep declines in populations of children under the age of eight are expected to be seen in rapidly aging states with low birth rates like California, Illinois, Hawaii, Vermont, New Mexico and West Virginia. States that benefit from intra-country migration, and which have relatively [...]
The nation with the world's lowest fertility rate crashed through another record level in 2019. South Korea's fertility rate declined to 0.92 children per woman in 2019 from 0.98 a year earlier. An article in the Nikkei Asian Review said many women in South Korea blame high housing prices, rising childcare costs and difficulty in [...]
Demographic Intelligence's Lyman Stone provides a broad overview of the confluence of factors that are causing fertility rates to sink across the globe in a lengthy piece for National Review. As D.I. readers know, falling birthrates can be attributed to industrialization, the widespread use of contraception and delayed marriage. There may be even one other factor [...]
Demographic Intelligence leaders feature prominently in a new Forbes piece examining the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control that showed U.S. birthrates fell yet again in 2018. Fertility usually declines in times of economic difficulty, so the slide during the Great Recession and its aftermath was expected. But births have yet to rebound in [...]
In a provocative essay for The New York Times, Anna Louise Sussman examined the connection between "late capitalism" in the developed world and declining birthrates. As Demographic Intelligence has well documented, there is a widening gap between desired fertility and actual fertility. The essay combines anecdotes with regular people talking about the circumstances of their own delayed [...]
Destination Maternity recently filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection and announced plans to shutter stores nationwide amid sagging sales. While competition, especially from online sources, certainly surely played a role, Destination Maternity in its bankruptcy petition citing falling birthrates as a major reason for its struggles. Business Insider cited Demographic Intelligence Advisor Lyman Stone's analysis [...]
The steep worldwide decline in births is getting more and more attention in the news. Bloomberg recently did a deep dive on includes conversations with women across the world about their marriage and childbearing decisions. It also has a fascinating searchable visualization of falling fertility in nearly every country worldwide. Read and explore the whole [...]
A look at Michigan's fertility trends paints a clear picture as to why the state's population figures have stagnated over the last decade. An article at Mlive.com shows that there were fewer children born in Michigan in 2018 than in 1942. Its fertility rate has slumped to 1.7 children per woman, though that is fairly [...]
In a new study posted at the Institute for Family Studies, Demographic Intelligence Advisor Lyman Stone reveals that fertility rates continue to fall across the globe. While there are a few places where birthrates are on the rise, most notably in nations that used to be part of the Soviet bloc, those are anomalies and [...]
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