Teen birth rate hits record low

[The Straight Story]

Teen birth rate hits record low
By Rob Stein
As the nation continued to struggle in the recession in 2009, the rate at which U.S. women are having babies continued to fall, pushing the teen birth rate to a record low, federal officials reported Tuesday.

The birth rate among U.S. girls aged 15 to 19 fell to 39.1 births per 1,000 teens in 2009, the most recent year for which statistics are available. That's a 6 percent drop from 2008 and the lowest rate ever recorded in the nearly 70 years that the federal government has been collecting reliable data, according to a preliminary analysis of data from the National Center for Health Statistics.

"The decline in teen births is really quite amazing," said Bradley E. Hamilton, who helped perform the analysis.

The drop marked the second year in a row the birth rate among teens fell, meaning it has dropped for 16 out of the past 18 years. The 8 percent two-year decline strengthens the belief that a two-year increase during the preceding two years was an aberration.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/checkup/2010/12/teen_birth_rate_hits_record_lo.html

[GKirk]

1. I find it interesting

that the teen birth rate is lower now than it was in the 1940's and 50's.
Although, I suppose this doesn't mean all the births in the 40's or 50's (or even now for that matter)
were out of wedlock births. Do people still say 'out of wedlock' now a days?:)

[cherish44]

2. doesn't seem to be the case in my small town...

Thing is in my small town high school (graduated 1985) I don't recall any pregnant girls at my school and I knew everyone...(well there was one girl my senior year...) cut to this same school in 2010 and there are freshman and sophomores having babies and it's all fun and cute to these girls. That's a sad thing.