America's birthrate is tanking. People who study fertility and families say there are lots of reasons for that: college debt, political uncertainty, climate change, rising home prices, delayed marriage. We’ll talk about what all this means for the future, and what can be done to reverse the trend.
Monday, we’re talking about the American birthrate. In short, it’s tanking. The decline started when the Great Recession hit, and it just continues to fall. People who study fertility and families say there are lots of reasons for that. There’s college debt, political uncertainty, climate change, rising home prices, delayed marriage—the list goes on. People are even having less sex than they used to. We’ll talk about what all this means for the future, and what can be done to reverse the trend.
GUESTS
- Lyman Stone is an economist based in Washington, D.C. He is a research fellow at the Institute for Family Studies and an adviser at Demographic Intelligence, a consulting firm. He blogs at In a State of Migration and a co-host of the podcast Migration Nation.
- Stephanie Coontz teaches history and family studies at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, and is Director of Research and Public Education for the Council on Contemporary Families. She's the author of several books, including The Way We Really Are and The Way We Never Were.
