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Home Front: Culture Wars
Births to Unmarried U.S. Women Set Record
2005-10-29
Not good for the children or for society.
Nearly 1.5 million babies, a record, were born to unmarried women in the United States last year, the government reported Friday. And it isn't just teenagers any more. "People have the impression that teens and unmarried mothers are synonymous," said Stephanie Ventura of the National Center for Health Statistics.

But last year teens accounted for just 24 percent of unwed births, down from 50 percent in 1970, she commented. The increases in unmarried births have been among women in their 20s, she said, particularly those 25 to 29. Many of the women in that age group are living with partners but still count as unmarried mothers if they haven't formally married, Ventura noted.

Among teens, more than 80 percent of mothers were unmarried.

There were 1,470,152 babies born to single women in 2004, 35.7 percent of all births in the country, NCHS said. That was up from 1,415,995 a year earlier.

Births to older women continued to increase, Brady Hamilton of NCHS pointed out, reflecting choices these women are making in terms of careers and having families. The birth rate for women aged 35 to 39 increased 4 percent from 2003 to 2004. It was up 3 percent for women aged 40 to 44 and 9 percent for those 45 to 49.

Other findings of the report included:

  • There was a total of 4,115,590 births in the country in 2004, up from 4,089,950 in 2003.

  • Births to whites declined by nearly 18,000 while Hispanics were up 32,000, there was an increase of more than 8,000 in births to Asians and a rise of just 72 births among black women.

  • The total birth rate was 14.0 per 1,000 women, down from 14.1 in 2003.

  • The birth rate for women aged 15 to 19 was 41.2 per 1,000, down from 41.6 in 2003 and a record low. The teen birth rate was 61.8 in 1991 and has been declining since.
    • Posted by:Mom

    #7  Feed them yourself and pay for their jailboard twenty years later. No excuses such as the devil (substance abuse) made me do it. Or poverty; animals feed their young, etc. They do because they can take our work proceeds.
    Posted by: Bardo   2005-10-29 17:11  

    #6  Well, since Walter Williams and Thomas Sowell say the same thing CT1079 does, I guess he's right.

    Three of my daughter's 'friends' in high school have had children in the last year, including one that's only 16 NOW, which means she was 15 when she became pregnant. This year's graduating class from her high school had 59 people that didn't graduate because of pregnancies or childbirth, out of 335.

    TT5706 is also right that lack of NEGATIVE consequences sends a message to these women that it's "ok". I don't think we should go back to stoning "adultresses", but these children need to learn that there are consequences for doing stupid things. Getting pregnant in high school, unless you're married, is STUPID.

    Of my daughter's friends, only one plans to finish her high school education, which means the other two will have even greater difficulty later in life. My daughter plans to get married this summer, but insists she'll finish her college education before she has children.
    Posted by: Old Patriot   2005-10-29 15:26  

    #5  Crereter - WRONG, WRONG, WRONG!! Poverty is caused by George Bush. Don't you bother to read the MSM? Poverty only occurs during Republican administrations, and instantly vanishes whenever Dems are in office.
    Posted by: DMFD   2005-10-29 12:08  

    #4  There is one major cause of poverty in America.

    Insufficient consequences.

    Government social action is directed toward ameliorating the consequences of the behaviors CT1079 identified instead of making their consequences more intense and public, thus dioscouraging the next generation from indulging in them.
    Posted by: Theash Thinter5706   2005-10-29 12:00  

    #3  Basically, the three major causes of poverty in America -

    Substance Abuse [free will]
    Single Female Head of Household [free will]
    Blowing off one's education [partial free will, partial teachers union]

    We can do something about the last one, but all poverty programs will fail unless it is understood that as long as we allow people free choices there will always be those who choose self destructive behaviors. Therefore there will aways be some poverty in a free society.
    Posted by: Crereter Thuting1079   2005-10-29 10:30  

    #2  I have only one thing to say : http://www.africancrisis.org/images/USAFederalAssistance.jpg
    (ok, not completly to the point, my bad).
    Posted by: anonymous5089   2005-10-29 10:06  

    #1  WTF?
    Posted by: closedanger   2005-10-29 08:27  

    00:00