TY  - JOUR
AU  - Preston,Samuel H.
AU  - Hartnett,Caroline Sten
TI  - The Future of American Fertility
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 14498
PY  - 2008
Y2  - November 2008
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w14498
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w14498.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Samuel H. Preston
School of Arts and Sciences
289 McNeil Building
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6298
Tel: 215/746-5396
Fax: 215/898-2124
E-Mail: spreston@sas.upenn.edu

Caroline Sten Hartnett
3718 Locust Walk, Rm 239
Population Studies Ctr
Philadelphia, PA 19104
E-Mail: csten@pop.upenn.edu
M1  - published as Samuel H. Preston, Caroline Sten Hartnett. "The Future of American Fertility," in John B. Shoven, editor, "Demography and the Economy" University of Chicago Press (2011)

AB  - This paper reviews the major social and demographic forces influencing American fertility levels with the aim of predicting changes during the next three decades. Increases in the Hispanic population and in educational attainment are expected to have modest and offsetting effects on fertility levels. A cessation of the recent pattern of increasing ages at childbearing will at some point put upward pressure on period (but not cohort) fertility rates. Higher relative wages for women and better contraception have empowered women and fundamentally altered marriage and relations between the sexes. But women's childbearing has become less dependent upon stable relations with men, and educational differences in intended fertility have narrowed. One explanation of higher fertility in the U.S. than in other developed countries is that its institutions have adapted better to rising relative wages for women and the attendant increase in women's labor force participation.
ER  -