Skip to main content
 

Adults in their prime childbearing years are having fewer kids than the generations before them, something that came to a head in 2023 when the U.S. fertility rate reached its lowest level ever. And while every individual has their own reasons for not conceiving, the soaring cost of living is a major consideration for younger generations.

“We have a pretty strong set of prerequisites: You absolutely should finish school, and have a decent job, and you should make a decent income, and you should be in a good partnership, and you should live on your own,” Karen Benjamin Guzzo, a sociology professor and director of the Carolina Population Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, told The Washington Post about the phenomenon. “That takes a while to accomplish, especially in this day and age. Some people may feel like they’re never going to be in a good place.”

Fortune