New Baby Boom
17 January 2008 by Stardust Against the trend, U.S. births way up
Well, global warming, diminishing resources, over-population doesn’t seem to be bothering a lot of people here in the US of A and many other countries as shown on the graph to the left.
ATLANTA – Bucking the trend in many other wealthy industrialized nations, the United States seems to be experiencing a baby boomlet, reporting the largest number of children born in 45 years.
The nearly 4.3 million births in 2006 were mostly due to a bigger population, especially a growing number of Hispanics. That group accounted for nearly one-quarter of all U.S. births. But non-Hispanic white women and other racial and ethnic groups were having more babies, too.
An Associated Press review of birth numbers dating to 1909 found the total number of U.S. births was the highest since 1961, near the end of the baby boom. An examination of global data also shows that the United States has a higher fertility rate than every country in continental Europe, as well as Australia, Canada and Japan. Fertility levels in those countries have been lower than the U.S. rate for several years, although some are on the rise, most notably in France.
Experts believe there is a mix of reasons: a decline in contraceptive use, a drop in access to abortion, poor education and poverty.
*snip”
Other factors include recent declines in contraceptive use here; limited access to abortion in some states; and a 24/7 economy that provides opportunities for mothers to return to work, he said.
Also, it is more common for American women to have babies out of wedlock and more common for couples here to go forward with unwanted pregnancies. And, compared with nations like Italy and Japan, it’s more common for American husbands to help out with chores and child care.
There are regional variations in the United States. New England’s fertility rates are more like Northern Europe’s. American women in the Midwest, South and certain mountain states tend to have more children.
The influence of certain religions in those latter regions is an important factor, said Ron Lesthaeghe, a Belgian demographer who is a visiting professor at the University of Michigan. “Evangelical Protestantism and Mormons,” he said.
As a mother, I understand the desire to have children to love and carry on the family name and all that, but I think it is irresponsible and selfish to have a whole flock of children like many people do for various reasons. They keep having kids, and many of them cannot afford them, but have them anyway. And not using contraceptives in this day and age in the United States of America or any other Western nation is totally irresponsible, even if you come from a low-income community. The education is there, free clinics are available as well as Planned Parenthood where those who cannot afford it can get free contraceptives. As for the religious nutjobs popping out babies because their mythology books says “go forth and multiply”…well that is just plain idiocy.
17 January 2008, on 3:36 pm
The Duggars alone helped push that number up.
New England’s fertility rates are more like Northern Europe’s. American women in the Midwest, South and certain mountain states tend to have more children.
I see they didn’t bother to mention the average educational level of people in these areas. Who want to bet on inverse correlation?
17 January 2008, on 3:45 pm
Mrs Duggars is just a baby-making machine. She pops them out and makes the other children care for them. All the older kids take care of the younger kids, and all being raised with the same brainwashing to turn them into delusional sheeple. Hopefully some of them will escape and break from the herd mentality.
I don’t understand why xians and other god botherers hate this world to much that they have to delude themselves with some fantastic fairy tales of some afterlife, but at the same time they keep filling this terrible world with more people who will hate this world and long for an afterlife somewhere over the rainbow. Puzzles the shit out of me. And if “children are the heritage of the Lawd” then why doesn’t the Lawd just make himself some baby angels in heaven since that is where this god wants everyone to be anyway….dipshit stupidasses
17 January 2008, on 5:07 pm
The Duggars are really quite reprehensible in so MANY ways, including their unchecked fecundity.
I think the religious correlation is the key really. In countries where religion (almost any religion) is culturo-central, the birth rate is high. Civilised, secular countries have lower birth rates.
I view the xian and islamist mandates on women to produce as many children as possible to be an example of the vile, misogynist, capitalist nature of religion, reducing women to the equivalent of nothing more than an “brood mare” a man “owns.”
Part of me wants to gather up all these women for some serious deprogramming. I can’t fathom how a woman would let herself be used like that unless she WAS brainwashed.
17 January 2008, on 5:15 pm
Jesus Imaginary Christ, I hate the god-damned quiverfulls. I hate them more than just about any other sect. Mass starvation due to overpopulation is on their heads, and it won’t be a pretty sight.
17 January 2008, on 5:43 pm
I notice the graph says that the current rate is the one required to replenish and keep stable our population, which outwardly would mean a good thing, but it doesn’t go into exactly what number of people is sustainable on our available resources and at what standard of living, or if maintaining the same number of people is a good idea given available and future resources. The statement seems to me to say to the casual reader, “Hey, this is good! We want more babies to grow up and take care of us when we age!”
The problem, of course, is that unless we provide these babies with proper rearing, health care, education, and finances, there’s no guarantee they’ll be able to care for us when we’re older. Heck, I don’t earn enough to support my parents (who fortunately don’t need it, at least not yet); how is the next generation, who undoubtedly will have their own health and financial problems, going to sustain theirs?
And yet people continue to vote against their own economic, financial, and wellbeing interests…
17 January 2008, on 10:54 pm
Did you not read about the decrease in access to services like contraception, abortion, and factual sex education for impoverished people? When you get done patting yourself on the back for only having one or two or whatever kids, maybe you should go back and read it again.
the fundie Quiverfull idiots are only a small percentage of the problem. Want birthrates to go back down? Advocate for the education and empowerment of women and children in traditionally patriarchal cultures (like Hispanics) and try to minimize the influence of religious control over reproductive choices (I know, not going to happen soon, but we should still try) .
People should be responsible for their choices, yes, but when they don’t have many or any options, it’s kind of hard to make them in the first place. Keep in mind: “Experts believe there is a mix of reasons: a decline in contraceptive use, a drop in access to abortion, poor education and poverty.” Many women’s clinics in urban and rural areas have been shut down or their operations greatly scaled back. I’m all about personal accountability, but there are too many disturbing socioeconomic factors at work here to pin overpopulation on one group or one mode of thinking.
17 January 2008, on 11:41 pm
Cat, actually, I did read that and I think that decrease in access to services like contraception , abortion and factual sex education for impoverished people depends on where one lives. And I am not patting myself on the back for having my three children. I had a lot of problems, medically having them, lost a child at birth, and miscarried. Then ironically, had to have my tubes tied after the birth of our third….who was a surprise. So, I know “accidents” happen even when one is being careful.
Here in Illinois, things are actually getting better for women:
Take Action for Reproductive Rights in Illinois
17 January 2008, on 11:48 pm
Another factor influencing U.S. birth rates that does not seem to be mentioned in the article above is immigration. Most immigrants are from countries that have higher birthrates than native born Americans. Their American born descendants though will probably have lower birth rates.
17 January 2008, on 11:55 pm
In reference to what Tommy commented ^^, the article did mention this about immigrants:
18 January 2008, on 12:06 am
The mention of the Duggers brood somehow goosed a Python memory.
Yeah, Stardust…again with my “Link-aholicism”?
I know, we’ve all seen it…BUTT…
it hits the mark on so many related items; and I guess with all the constant religious nonsense…
What!…we could all use another laugh?…
“IT’S…
The “Meaning of Life – The Miracle of Birth” [long version 9:15]
[with, of course, the ever popular..."Every Sperm is Sacred"]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47P59ha9k9s
18 January 2008, on 12:49 am
When I see this, a worry comes: shouldn’t we be trying to at least halfway keep up with these people? I understand there are costs involved, but think of what it’ll do to the gene pool if they take over! And the resource issue isn’t as bad if you make a point of walking/driving places and eating less meat. Costs, I know, but think of the gene pool!
18 January 2008, on 1:17 am
Well, that’s what zero population growth is for. We are two people, we make two people. Very simple.
Of course accidents happen, but it’s a good idea to try it, nonetheless.
And who the hell are the Duggers? Now I’m going to have to look this up.
18 January 2008, on 1:35 am
Chris, is this what you’re worried about?
http://anexerciseinfutility.blogspot.com/2008/01/is-this-whats-in-store-for-humanity.html
18 January 2008, on 1:43 am
honestpoet…
Actually Spirula spelled the name right.
It’s the “Duggar Family”.
Heres one article about them; from Fri., Sept. 21, 2007:
“Meet the Duggar family — all 19 of them”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20134584/
Yeah…YIKES!
18 January 2008, on 9:15 am
All this hand wringing over population. Look, nature is going to fix the problem. Just think of global warming, fossil fuel depletion, and virulent disease are credits in the old check book. All these kids will soon enough be dying of malnutrition, disease, and war. Maybe we’ll get lucky and go extinct.
Sorry, Huckabee was on TV this morning explaining the history of the Constitution and I just came down with a raging fever of misanthropy.
18 January 2008, on 9:49 am
Sorry, Huckabee was on TV this morning explaining the history of the Constitution
I could not stomach that at the beginning of my day…
FUCK HUCK!
19 January 2008, on 4:20 am
Stardust,
I’m sorry you had to go through all that devastating stuff with having your kids. The original post sounded accusatory of poor people and religious groups for the US’s population problems, so I felt a response was in order. Poverty issues are a little touchy for me, and I’m very loathe to blame the poor for problems arising from lack of access to services, education, and money, though I realize that’s not what you were doing.
Chris, I don’t believe we have an obligation to “outbreed” the religious doofuses (doofii?
in this country. I was raised by fundie hard-core Republicans, and I turned out to be the opposite. There’s still hope for the next generations of kids, even the ones coming from uber-religious backgrounds. It’s been my personal experience that fundy kids are more likely to rebel against their super-oppressive belief systems and realize that civilization as we know it is evolving into more enlightened times. As for general stupidity? Eh, I’m not holding out much hope for the end of that.
The Duggars are a strict fundamentalist Baptist family of 17 children who are adamantly against birth control. Their daughters do all the chores (in long ankle-length skirts, never pants) and take care of the babies as their mother pops them out, and the boys get to aspire to high-power careers and play with the family dog. Gotta love stifling gender roles.
19 January 2008, on 2:24 pm
Some very interesting points being brought up–really enjoyed this post!
I actually read an article related to this a few months ago in Free Inquiry. The article spoke about our current “Ponzi world economics, and how it actually encourages each generation to produce more children than the previous, as economic growth in our current system is dependent upon (as was touched on by Eve) more people in the younger generation to produce more and to finance the previous generation’s waning years. This is only redoubled by the fact that each generation is being kept alive longer by medical science, and therefore even more resources needed to care for each generation during their “golden years.”
As for sustainability, most of the studies done conclude that we long ago surpassed a sustainable number of people in this world. By most estimates, the earth is only capable of sustaining 1/2 a billion to 2 billion people (at most.)
Lifestyle choices, such as those made by the Duggars go beyond irresponsible to downright immoral and (granted, unintentionally) sadistic, as there is a good possibility their own children may suffer in a world that’s not big enough to support them.
Fact of nature–if we as a species do nothing, we really have nothing to worry about–the earth will effectively take care of things for us by “thinning the herd” (as Todd mentioned) through climate change, disease (more people in closer quarters spreading disease more effectively), war (more people having to fight for increasingly scarce resources) and finally, famine.
The Duggars (and their Islamic counterparts) are what we get when people follow the dictates of an iron age cult–one whose intended audience was a small, pre-scientific iron age tribe that needed to build it’s numbers to assert itself in a world that had an unimaginably high infant/child mortality rate. A tribe that could not imagine our current world, and was not writing down it’s oral tradition for our benefit at any rate.
But, of course, the Lord shall provide, right…
19 January 2008, on 2:27 pm
Oh, yeah, and Fuck Huck.
19 January 2008, on 4:24 pm
Fritz, your comments reminded me of something George Carlin said:
Save the planet? The planet’s doing fine! It’s the people who are fucked! The planet will still be here long after we’re gone.
19 January 2008, on 8:53 pm
Re: the Duggar’s need to show off by producing surplus humans.
Why?
22 January 2008, on 10:38 pm
Love that Carlin quote, Tommykey!