DOWN AND DOWN

American Women Had Babies at Record-Low Rates Last Year

The general fertility rate hit its lowest level since the government started to track the figure way back in 1909.

U.S. births plunged to their lowest total in 35 years in 2019, according to federal figures released Wednesday and reported by The Wall Street Journal. About 3.75 million babies were born in the U.S. in 2019, which marks a decrease of around 1 percent from 2018. Meanwhile, the general birth rate fell 2 percent to just 58.2 per 1,000 women aged 15 to 44—its lowest level since the government started to track the figure way back in 1909. American birthrates started to decline during the 2007-09 recession but didn’t fully rebound when the economy recovered. Teenagers have seen the sharpest drop in births—since the peak in 1991, the teen birthrate has fallen by a massive 73 percent. The total fertility rate—the average number of babies a woman would have over her lifetime—dropped to 1.7 in 2019, a small decline from the previous year and another record low.