Washington D.C., Aug 20, 2008 / 23:11 pm
A new Census Bureau report shows that more women in their 40s are childless, while those who are having children are having fewer than ever before. The same report, released on Monday, shows that more than 28 percent of children born in the year preceding the 2006 survey were born to mothers who had never been married.
According to the Census Bureau’s report “Fertility of American Women: 2006,” over the last 30 years the number of women aged 40 to 44 with no children has doubled from 10 percent to 20 percent. Women of that age group who are mothers have an average of 1.9 children each, more than one child fewer than women in the same age group in 1976.
The census report used data from an annual survey of 76 million women ages 15 to 50 conducted from January through December 2006, the Associated Press reports. The data allows a state-by-state comparison of fertility patterns, collating statistics which could be used by state agencies to evaluate the need for maternal care services.
About 4.2 million women participating in the survey in 2006 had had a child in the previous year.