First Come Love, Then Comes Marriage. The End.

LA Times, December 2013

In May of 2013 we posted an article about How Motherhood is Changing, noting that "Single motherhood is growing, there's a drop off in birth rates and babies outside of marriage are common across all income levels." It appears, though, that the drop off in birth rates for single ladies isn't the only drop; now married women are increasingly likely to not have children. The National Center for Family & Marriage found that the percentage of married women (ages 40 to 44) who had no children in the household reached 6% from 2006-2010. Not having kids by your 40s is nearly twice as likely as it was 40 years ago.

The dropping marriage rate is one of the biggest reason behind this drop, as is more women waiting till later in life to have children. With more women receiving higher levels of education and spending more time working outside the home, a shift is certainly happening in the time line of motherhood, and in the role of child-rearing in a marriage. Unlike generations prior, getting married and having kids is no longer mutually exclusive. Pew Survey's have found love and companionship more important to a marriage than kids, and a shrinking percentage of respondents saying having kids being a feature of a successful marriage. And, with more births happening outside of marriage, having children is no longer confined to marriage.

Nonetheless, the majority (90%) of American's say they have or want to have children, according to Gallup; they just might not be getting married to have those kids.

ARTICLE:
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-childless-couples-20131208,0,2037401.story#ixzz2n6InLbDl