Since the 1970’s and for decades we have been warned that a population explosion was going to threaten the environment, economy and the American way of life and Americas future as a vibrant and stable nation. It appears we are obeying a very popular motto on a bumper stick, put out by an anti-population growth group from the 1970s which declared: “MAKE LOVE, NOT BABIES.”
Now as we enter this new millennium all research suggests the thing which is most likely to change the demographic, social and cultural lives of Americans is not the population explosion that was predicted. It may in fact be just the opposite scenario. If the trend continues America will slowly shift from a culture of population growth to a nation of population decline.
The face of the American family has no doubt seen drastic and numerous changes since the child-rearing families of early settlers through the early 1900’s. America is following our European counterparts such as Germany, Russia, France and Sweden. We are quickly becoming an ever increasing society of child-free adults. More and more people in our country today are more likely to pass on the children thing and many are not to going to have a family at all, or at least not a traditional two parent and children household.
Census data confirms that the percentage of households with children has seen dramatic decline over the past forty years. In 1960 at least half of all households had children in the home. Today that number is less than one-third which is the lowest percentage in the nation’s history. The reasons are many and complex. The stability and value of the marriage relationship has greatly affected the desire and ability to successfully rear children.
To start with, we are all familiar with the much quoted statistic that half of all marriages end in divorce. This unfortunate trend has not improved much over the recent decades At the same time there is an even more disturbing threat to the institution of marriage and that is a dramatic increase in cohabitating couples. Over half of all first marriages are now preceded by living together, compared to virtually none 50 years ago. Many of these are those who never plan on marrying. The increasing trend between the years 1970 and 1994, showed that unmarried couples who cohabitate rose from about 500,000 to almost 3.7 million. An alarming number of couples have given up on the institution of marriage and are choosing to live together rather than marry (see Figure 1.).
Figure 1. Number of Cohabiting, Unmarried, Adult Couples of the Opposite Sex, by Year, United States
Year Number
1960 0.439
1970 0.523
1980 1.589
1990 2.856
2000 4.736
2002 4.898
Source: U. S. Bureau of the Census, Current Population Reports, Series P20-537; America’s Families and Living Arrangements: March 2000; and Unmarried-Couple Households, by Presence of Children: 1960 to Present, Table UC-1, June 12, 2003 (www.census.gov/population/socdemo/hh-fam/tabUC-1.pdf) and earlier reports.
Of course cohabitating couples are almost always involved in sexual relationships and as a whole our society is more prone to accepting sex outside of and prior to marriage. Therefore the concept of marriage as a required component to a sexual relationship is certainly an outdated concept. For many the idea of sex and marriage has been successfully separated. Once you have separated these two in your mind and provide the technological capability “the pill” then it is just one more step to separate procreation from the equation also. Therefore due to the decline of the importance of the marriage relationship a greater number of adults are removing themselves from the child-rearing equation and just decide that neither marriage or children are part of there future.
A second factor greatly affecting the fertility rate in America is the postponing of children until later in life. The average American woman was almost 25 years old when she had her first child in the year 2000. That’s compared to an average age of 21.4 years for a first birth in 1970, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Women are waiting longer to have children and because of this trend there are at least two factors contributing to the overall decline in the fertility rate.
First by waiting this typically means they will have fewer children. Of course one can not conclude that just waiting later attributes to the decision to have fewer children, as that could have been the plan all along. However we must realize that just by couples waiting to later in life, women limit the possibility that they may rear more children in their lifetime. The decision to wait is often accompanied at a higher level by difficulties not experienced by younger mothers.
In particular, the second factor is the increased risk of biological infertility is increased the longer a potential mother waits. To many it would appear we have a greater number of infertile couples in America, when in fact it may be that we have an increased awareness due to couples waiting to later in life to have a child.
At one time it would have been traditionally, socially and medically preferable to have all of your children before reaching your early thirties. Now the trend particularly in urban areas in is that women are increasingly having their first babies in their 30s. As a matter of fact about twenty percent of women today choose to have their babies after 30. At the same time of about one third of the couples in which the woman is over 35 have fertility problems.
The process of aging decreases a woman’s chances of having a baby in the following ways:
• The ability of a woman’s ovaries to release eggs ready for fertilization declines with age.
• The health of a woman’s eggs declines with age.
• As a woman ages she is more likely to have health problems that can interfere with fertility.
• As a women ages, her risk of having a miscarriage increases.
Why are women waiting? In a 2002 Centers for Disease Control report the research notes that: “Several factors may account for the delay in childbearing, most importantly educational opportunities and career choices for women. From 1970 to 2000, the number of women completing college has nearly doubled and the number in the labor force has gone up by almost 40 percent. Changes in contraception use, economic cycles, social support and marriage patterns should also be considered.”
A third significant trend in a reduced fertility rate is the reduction in the number of children by the average household. In 1915 the average household was 4.5, by 1967 it dropped to 3.0. Today just forty years later it is about 2.6. In early Agricultural America children were assets. The more children the easier it was to run the family farm or business. Moving from an agricultural to an industrial society now transforms a great number of children to being a financial liability.
The latest census data clearly supports that note only are traditional family values on the decline, but the very structure of the traditional family is undergoing a serious transformation. A little over 30 years ago 21 percent of households had five or more people. Now that is less than 10 percent. One and two person households have risen sharply while as a result three or more person households are on the decline (figure 2).
The final trend is even more disturbing as well as difficult to understand and accept. There are an alarming number of perfectly healthy couples who are married or plan to marry and simply decided that children are not a part of their life’s plan. This is couples who are healthily and fully capable of having children, but reject any notion that they have a responsibility to raise children. The trend is defined as “chosen childlessness.” Again these are couples who are not struggling with infertility, or who have genuine medical reasons in which they must avoid having children. It is not folks who are delaying, or limiting the amount of children they will have. It is couples who say, “we don’t want kids.”
In fact population statistics are predicting that that one in five women who are now of childbearing age may never have children, while only about seven percent are due to infertility problems. This trend is those who are making a deliberate decision not to have children as a matter of lifestyle decision. This is not a distinct American problem many European nations are have already dropped below the what we call the sub-replacement fertility rate (Figure 3), and are now facing the very real problem that the number of young people is declining to a point that these countries are approaching a population crisis.
Figure 3.
That crisis is marked with problems like who will support an aging population, feed the people, sustain the economy, and pay the bills. Ironically some of these countries which once placed penalties on to many children now are giving tax and other incentive for couples to have children.
The reasons these couples give are varied and honestly some are quite disturbing. Many Americans point to economic considerations, and in fact those with fewer children have higher incomes, more freedom and greater chances enjoy more leisure, travel and dining. Some would simply state that it would not work well with their lifestyle. One author describes the trend, “A growing proportion of today’s well-educated young adult’s step into high paying jobs shortly after they finish their education. They may have college loans to pay off, but their financial obligations are theirs alone. They aren’t yet responsible for others. And their pay-checks and credit cards are stretched to include more than bare necessities. They eat out, go drinking, take vacations, get big screen TVs, join health clubs and buy tickets to sports events and concerts. Even the less well-educated and less well-employed spend money on affordable luxuries for themselves—one reason for the astonishing growth and success of Starbucks.”
Figure 4.
Although it would certainly be wrong to conclude that this is true of every decision not to have children I must conclude from reading all the explanations that the primary motivational factor not to have children appears to be summed up in a single word, selfishness. This appears at best to be the number one reason for couples choosing not to have children, when the couple had no religious (celibacy) or medical reasons not to, and many are not ashamed of it.
I want to conclude this analysis of the trend of chosen childlessness with a look at the number one supporter of this movement. That is the separation of the sex act from procreation largely made possible by the widespread use of modern birth control. We now live in a contraceptive culture. Nearly all women of reproductive age have used contraception: 98 percent of all women who had ever had intercourse had used at least one contraceptive method. About 82 percent of women have used the oral contraceptive pill at some time in their lives; about 90 percent have had a partner use the male condom.
I am not suggesting that women who choose contraception to delay or plan pregnancy are wrong in doing so. I do not believe we are required by God to maximize the number of children we are capable of having, which by most estimates would be accompanied by 12-15 children, during the normal fertility cycle of an adult woman. However, we must recognize that the increased use and availability of birth control methods as well as the widespread increase in abortions in America life, has had a significant impact on the way we view sex, especially in terms of procreation.
Most all statistical data analyzed shows the sharpest decrease in birth rates beginning in the 50’s and 60’s with the most dramatic shifts in the 70’s. 1.2 millions American women are on the pill by 1967, despite some long standing resistance by the church and others, by the late 1970’s over 10 million are using the Pill. World wars, women in the workforce, high divorce rates, feminist movements all contribute in significant ways, but birth control methods have paved the way to a significant reduction in the birth rate or Americans.
Figure 5.
What is the biblical response? God has gifted the human race with a package of goods to be enjoyed while on this earth. The greatest good is the ability to know, serve and worship the very God who created us. Along with that comes the package of good which God created for us to enjoy while on this earth. For the human, the act of creation itself both male and female presents us with the goodness of relationship one with another.
The crowning act of creation was that of humankind, man and woman who were joined to enjoy the package of goods which God had created for them. Chief among these gift of goods is the marriage relationship, accompanied the proper venue for enjoying the sexual desires with which He created us with. Finally the good gift of procreation serves to bring joy to not only the couple, but to God himself.
The Christian is to claim all the goods intended for them at the beginning of creation. This means adulthood equals marriage and marriage under normal circumstances is to be open to gift of children. The Psalmist declared: “Behold, children are a gift of the Lord, the fruit of the womb is a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one’s youth. How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them; they will not be ashamed when they speak with their enemies in the gate.” [Psalm 127: 3-5]
SOURCES
Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, The State of Our Unions: The Social Health of Marriage in America 2004
www.census.gov/population/socdemo/hh-fam/tabMS-1.pdf
The National Women’s Health information center. http://4women.gov/faq/infertility.htm#h
American Women Waiting to Begin Families Average Age at First Birth up More than Three Years from 1970 to 2000. http://www.cdc.gov/od/oc/media/pressrel/r021211.htm
Alex Chediak, Economic Ramifications of Childlessness, http://www.alexchediak.com/blog/2006/07/economic_ramifications_of_chil.php
http://www.beliefnet.com/Faiths/2005/06/Deliberate-Childlessness-Moral-Rebellion-With-A-New-Face.aspx
