Nearly 41% of American Babies Born Out of Wedlock - The Takeaway Might Not Be What You Think

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (numbers via CNSnews), 40.7% of American babies were born to unwed mothers. While this might, at first blush, seem to be indicative of a teen mom baby boom, a deeper dive indicates that this might not be such a problematic statistic. From CNSnews:

"While the overall birth rate declined to a record low, the birth rates for women in the 35-39 and 40-44 age groups actually increased from 2010 to 2011.

 

Among all women in the United States (including those as young as 10 and as old as 54), the birth rate declined from 64.1 per 100,000 in 2010 to 63.2 per 100,000 in 2011. Among women 10 to 14 years old, it held steady at 0.4 per 100,000. Among women 15-19 years old, it declined from 34.2 to 31.3. Among women 20-24 years old, it declined from 90.0 to 85.3. Among women 25-29, it declined from 108.3 to 107.2. And among women 30-34 years old, it held steady at 96.5.

 

However, among women 35-39 years old, it increased from 45.9 per 100,000 to 47.2. Among women 40-44, it increased from 10.2 to 10.3. And among women from 45-54, it held steady at 0.7 per 100,000."

 

Sounds like a lot of career women deciding to have families to me. This might be bad for the producers of Teen Mom, but maybe not so much so from a societal perspective...