Ramifications for Decades to Come

Since the economic hurricane made landfall in the U.S., the response has been somewhat predictable.

Americans have slashed purchases of big ticket items such as cars and boats. They have cut back on spending for vacations, restaurant meals, and other discretionary items. They are repairing and recyling and trying to get the most out of what they already own. They are looking to pare down debt and save more of what they earn.

But things don't end there. Many people are also making more fundamental adjustments in the patterns of their lives.

In "Report: Birth Rates Fall In Tough Economy," CBS reveals that today's hard times are spurring a demographic shift that will have ramifications for decades to come.

The recession is leaving some doctor's offices empty. More women are putting motherhood on hold and recent reports show contraceptive sales are through the roof.

The data runs about two years behind, we won't know for sure until 2011, but it appears that with the economic slowdown has come something of a pregnant pause.

We all know that children are not cheap.

"It's a labor of love," says one parent.

What's love got to do with it? Many prospective parents are changing their plans when it comes to pregnancy. Planned Parenthood has seen an increase in patients, but they say economic effect is more because of lost jobs and health care.

CBS station KOVR-TV spoke with Carl Haub, a demographer with the Population Reference Bureau, who says the birth rate does appear to fall with economic declines. After the most recent recession in the early 1990s, the birth rate steadily declined through 1997, where it held relatively strong through 2006, the latest data available through the CDC.

After the Great Depression and the 1970s gas shortage, the nation saw record-lows in birth rates.

There are reports that health care facilities are offering free contraceptives and are seeing more taken, and that OBGYNs are seeing less business.

"No more kids," says Lizett Rodriguez, who is a mother of a five-month-old.

Data on birth rates today isn't the only trend suspected of changing, although numbers aren't yet available, adoption and abortion rates could be figures to watch as well.

Comments

[roger]

On the other hand.....well educated/prosperous people
tend to have small families,poor, uneducated, religious
people tend to have very large families(this is well documented)
Whats wrong?maybe its only a temporary thing just to accommodate
the hard times

[Steve]

This was also a key to the Great Depression. Birth rates were very low in the '30's. So those born in this time had an (relatively) extraordinary easy time in life. They missed WWII, and Vietnam, although not Korea. For men, like my father born in 1931, they had little competition for jobs. There were fewer children in his age group, as well as many in the older group who were killed or maimed in the war. He had great jobs including management jobs all his life, despite barely making it past High School. See the book "Outliers:" by Malcolm Gladwell for more about "timing" as part of success or failure in life.

[Don]

Fitting that you are calling it an "economic hurricane." Mission Control on the 13th day of the month? "Houston, we have a problem?"

http://www.marsroverblog.com/discuss-70739-discovery-flies-on-eve-of-atlantic-hurricane-season-arthur-forms.html

[Garth]

Think about the real,underlying source of bad news:
Global warming, ozone holes, rain forests shrinking, peak oil/oil wars, dead zones in ocean life, dying coral, pollution. The list goes on.

And the ultimate cause? ....the human virus
(my absolute favorite line in the Matrix movie trilogy was the machines equating humans with viruses).

Yes unfortunately, this is a serious post. The world can sustain perhaps 1 billion comfortably, only we have 7 billion and growing.

This is the source of our problems.

[Mike Greenberg]

The birthrates will change to a dramatic rise once people realize the Ponzi scams of pension plans and social security.

In other words, parents need a healthy number of children to take care of them when they are old, the way things have always been.

[Marion Shaw]

I don't know which population this article is referring
to but white middle and upper middle class Americans
stopped having children of any significant numbers
30 years ago. Hundreds of junior high schools were closed
in the late 1970's and 80's and it was only the
massive influx of immigrants-both legal and illegal
that kept the American highschools going and the
economy humming along. Afterall, someone has got to be
around to buy all the stuff that is imported.

[roger]

come to think of it,,,,quoting CBS or any other media
establishment is putting your reputation on the line,
information can only be judged by the quality of the informant.

[Don]

The government is running the biggest Ponzi Scheme of them all, and they aren't in danger of prosecution. It will take all the trees in the U.S. to print enough money to cover this bad bet, which has been made on our behalf. If you are loaning out 15 dollars for every real dollar you have, then you lose 15 for every real dollar you have, when your assets suddenly lose 20% or more in value. This is doom, and why the Ponzi Scheme is over, just just for Madoff, but for the Federal Reserve system.