ATLANTA — Bucking the trend in many other wealthy industrialized nations, the United States seems to be experiencing a baby boomlet, reporting the largest number of children born in 45 years.
The nearly 4.3 million births in 2006 were mostly due to a bigger population, especially a growing number of Hispanics. That group accounted for nearly one-quarter of all U.S. births. But non-Hispanic white women and other racial and ethnic groups were having more babies too.
An Associated Press review of birth numbers dating to 1909 found the total number of U.S. births was the highest since 1961.
An examination of global data also shows that the U.S. has a higher fertility rate than every country in continental Europe, as well as Australia, Canada and Japan. Fertility levels in those countries have been lower than the U.S. rate for several years, although some are on the rise, most notably in France.
Experts believe there is a mix of reasons for the U.S. boom: a decline in contraceptive use, a drop in access to abortion, poor education and poverty.
There are cultural reasons as well. Hispanics as a group have higher fertility rates — about 40 percent higher than the U.S. overall. And experts say Americans view children more favorably than people in many other Westernized countries.
“Americans like children. We are the only people who respond to prosperity by saying, ‘Let’s have another kid,’ ” said Nan Marie Astone, associate professor of population, family and reproductive health at Johns Hopkins University.
Demographers say it’s too soon to know if the increase in births is the start of a trend.
Good news
To many economists and policymakers, the increase in births is good news. The U.S. fertility rate — the number of children a woman is expected to have in her lifetime — reached 2.1. That’s the “magic number” required for a population to replace itself.
Countries with much lower rates — such as Japan and Italy, both with a rate of 1.3 — face future labor shortages and eroding tax bases as they fail to reproduce enough to take care of their aging elders.
Demographers say there has been at least one boomlet before, around 1990, when annual U.S. births broke 4.1 million for two straight years. Adolescent childbearing was up at the time, but so were births among other groups, and experts aren’t sure what explained that bump.
The 2006 fertility rate of 2.1 children is the highest level since 1971. The fertility rate among Hispanics — 3 children per woman — has been a major contributor. That’s the highest rate for any group. In 2006, for the first time, Hispanics accounted for more than 1 million births.
The high rate probably reflects cultural attitudes toward childbirth developed in other countries, experts said. Fertility rates average 2.7 in Central America and 2.4 in South America. Fertility rates often rise among immigrants who leave their homelands for a better life.
Fertility levels tend to decline as women become better educated and gain career opportunities and as they postpone childbirth until they are older. Experts say those factors, along with the legalization of abortion and the expansion of contraception options, explain why the U.S. fertility rate dropped to its lowest point — about 1.7 — in 1976.
But while fertility declines persisted in many other developed nations, the U.S. saw the reverse: The fertility rate climbed to 2 in 1989 and has hovered around that mark since then, according to federal birth data.
Some factors include recent declines in contraceptive use here; limited access to abortion in some states; and a 2 4/7 economy that provides opportunities for mothers to return to work, said Duke University’s S. Philip Morgan, a leading fertility researcher.
Also, it is more common for American women to have babies out of wedlock and more common for couples to go forward with unplanned pregnancies.
