The fertility crisis in the United States is, in large part, a marriage crisis. Births to married women are only a tick below where they have been since the late 1980s, while births to unmarried women have fallen precipitously, by as much as 30% from a 2007 peak.
Conservatives, who’ve long bemoaned single parenthood, have scant reason to cheer this outcome. It’s not that people are waiting to have kids until after marriage. Rather, they’re increasingly opting out of committing to partnership and parenthood altogether. And as new research shows, progressives, especially, are less likely to find either marriage or parenthood worth pursuing. This, even as Americans on the Right of center remain committed to both.