Girls born to young mothers break cycle
Teen births, child poverty dropped dramatically in past 30 years
Brittnee Marsaw was born to a 15-yearold mother in St. Louis and raised by a grandmother who had given birth even younger. Half grown by the time her mother could support her, Marsaw joined her three states away but never found the bond she sought and calls the teen births of preceding generations “the family curse.”
Ana Alvarez was born in Guatemala to a teenage mother so poor and besieged that she gave her young daughter to a stranger, only to snatch her back. Soon her mother left to seek work in the United States, and after years of futilely awaiting her return, Alvarez made the same risky trip — becoming a teenager living in Washington, D.C., without legal permission — to reunite with the mother she scarcely knew.
While their experiences diverge, Marsaw and Alvarez share a telling trait. Stung by the struggles of their teenage mothers, both made unusually self-conscious vows not to become teen mothers themselves. And both say that delaying motherhood gave them — and now their children — a greater chance of success.
Their decisions highlight profound changes in two related forces that shape how opportunity is conveyed or impeded from one generation to the next. Teen births have fallen by more than three-quarters in the past three decades, a change of such improbable magnitude that experts struggle to fully explain it. Child poverty also plunged, raising a complex question: Does cutting teen births reduce child poverty, or does cutting child poverty reduce teen births?
While both may be true, it is not clear which dominates. One theory holds that reducing teen births lowers child poverty by allowing women to finish school, start careers and form mature relationships, raising their income before they raise children. Another says progress runs the other way: Cutting child poverty reduces teen births, since teenagers who see opportunity have motives to avoid getting pregnant.
Marsaw, who waited until 24 to have a child — a daughter, Zaharii — has considered the issue at length and embraces both views.
“This is a very, very, very good topic; it touches home with me in so many ways!” she said, adding that teen pregnancy and child poverty reinforce each other. “If you escape one, you have a better chance of escaping the other.”
Teen births have fallen by 77% since 1991, and among young teens, the decline is even greater: 85%, according to an analysis by Child Trends, a research group that studies children’s well-being. Births have fallen at roughly equal rates among teenagers who are white, Hispanic and Black, and they have fallen by more than half in every state.
The decline is accelerating: Teen births fell 20% in the 1990s, 28% in the 2000s and 55% in the 2010s. Three decades ago, one-quarter of 15-year-old girls became mothers before turning 20, according to Child Trends estimates, including nearly half of those who were Black or Hispanic. Today, just 6% of 15-year-old girls become teen mothers.
“These are dramatic declines — impressive, surprising and good for both teenagers and the children they eventually have,” said Elizabeth Wildsmith, a Child Trends researcher who did the analysis with a colleague, Jennifer Manlove. Not all teen mothers are poor, of course, and many who do experience poverty escape it. The reasons teen births have fallen are only partly understood. Contraceptive use has grown and shifted to more reliable methods, and adolescent sex has declined. Civic campaigns, welfare restrictions and messaging from popular culture may have played roles.
But with progress so broad and sustained, many researchers argue the change reflects something more fundamental: a growing sense of possibility among disadvantaged young women, whose earnings and education have grown faster than their male counterparts.
“They’re going to school and seeing new career paths open,” said Melissa S. Kearney, an economist at the University of Maryland. “Whether they are excited about their own opportunities or feel that unreliable male partners leave them no choice, it leads them in the same direction: not becoming a young mother.”
Mindful of their mothers’ struggles, Marsaw, 29, and Alvarez, 34, each offer a study of why teen births are falling and how the decline might affect upward mobility. One woman found it brought the prosperity she had sought. One hopes it still will.
On the surface, the decline in teen births is easy to explain: Contraception rose, and sex fell.
The share of female teens who did not use birth control the last time they had sex dropped by more than one-third over the past decade, according to an analysis of government surveys by the Guttmacher Institute. The share using the most effective form, long-acting reversible contraception (delivered through an intrauterine device or arm implant), rose fivefold to 15%. The use of emergency contraception also rose.
Contraception use has grown in part because it is easier to get, with the 2010 Affordable Care Act requiring insurance plans, including Medicaid, to provide it for free.
At the same time, the share of high school students who say they have had sexual intercourse has fallen 29% since 1991, Child Trends found. Some analysts, including Brad Wilcox, a sociologist at the University of Virginia, say the postponement of sex, which has intensified since 2013, stems in part from the time teens spend in front of screens.
Abortion does not appear to have driven the decline in teen births. As a share of teenage pregnancy, it has remained steady over the past decade, although the data, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, omits medication abortions, and analysts say the recent Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, eliminating the constitutional right to abortion, could cause teen births to rise.
If adolescent girls are more cautious with sex and birth control, what explains the caution? A common answer is that more feel they have something to lose. “There is just a greater confidence among young women that they have educational and professional opportunities,” Wilcox said.