| ■ Economy giving U.S. women pause about motherhood? | 2010.08.27 |
| U.S. birth rates in 2009 declined for the second straight year, a sign the economy may be causing some women to think twice about having children, U.S. health officials said on Friday. Estimates from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show 4,136,000 children were born in 2009, down 2.6 percent from the 2008 estimate. That followed a similar decline in 2008, the start of the economic downturn that has yet to abate. The CDC said the 2009 numbers are preliminary and could change. "We saw a decline in 2008 and 2009. The timing is very consistent with saying it is associated with the recession and the economy in general," Paul Sutton of the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics said in a telephone interview. More details on the demographics of mothers who gave birth in 2009 are needed to confirm the connection, Sutton said. |