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Depends... I use to know a lot of couples that married in the Depression era and almost all had only a single child and those with two were normally because the first born was a girl and they wanted to keep the family name...
My dad's mother was one of 12 children, and she and my grandfather had two boys because she didn't ever want to live like that again. she also didn't want my dad and uncle to grow up poor like she did.
I know lots of people who are still having big families...five or more kids.
One reason that people used to have really big families is that more kids used to die of diseases that we now have vaccines for, and there was a much higher infant mortality rate than there is now. So they had big families so they wouldn't lose everyone if several of their kids died.
I see the expectation to pay for kids' college mentioned over and over...when did that become the norm? When I was college age 15 years ago, everyone who didn't get a scholarship was getting student loans. I didn't have any friends whose parents were planning to pay their entire college expenses...they might help out with living expenses, insurance, etc. but that was it. My parents would have laughed if my sister or I suggested that they pay for school for us.
Studies have shown that the more educated the parents, the more likely it is that they will have fewer children. Not always true (I'm in Mormon territory, so we have a lot of large families out here, regardless of education level), but as an overall trend, it holds. I don't know for sure if this is causational or correlational, but I believe it be the cause, not just a coincidence.
In the old days, most people didn't have college degrees. Many didn't even finish high school, especially the girls. They had a lot of kids. But that could be attributed to all the things previously stated...high mortality rate, need for kids on the farm, need for kids to support parents, lack of birth control. But today, if you look at areas of the country with the lowest education rates, in general, they still have the highest number of kids per family. On the other hand, in households with 2 college educated parents, many are choosing to have 2 children or fewer, and often none at all.
Personally, I believe it is due to the fact that the more educated the parents, the more likely they are to have trained their brains to take all factors into consideration before deciding to have children. They want to have a career first, or buy a house first, or any number of other things. Whereas with less educated people, they don't really think things through as much. They don't look toward the future thinking "if I do this, how will it affect my life?". They just do.
I also think that more people who pursue higher education wait until later in life to start having children, which leads to fewer children overall as well.
I see the expectation to pay for kids' college mentioned over and over...when did that become the norm? When I was college age 15 years ago, everyone who didn't get a scholarship was getting student loans. I didn't have any friends whose parents were planning to pay their entire college expenses...they might help out with living expenses, insurance, etc. but that was it. My parents would have laughed if my sister or I suggested that they pay for school for us.
It happened when college prices skyrocketed.
For example, when my MIL went to college (she is in her mid-60s now) she went to Lehman College in NY... for free. It was free to everyone who had a certain GPA.
When I went to college (1997), a private college for engineering, in NYC, was 27k a year, including room and board. I am still paying student loans, have about 45K left.
Today, that same college is now $49,500 a year.
Who wants to burden their child with THAT much debt if they can help out? I don't even know if you can borrow that much money without taking out high interest rate private loans. Like Lacerta said, educated parents are all too aware of how much things like college will cost in the future (it's ridiculous today!) so they have to limit the amount of children they have in order to help them when the time comes.
They needed farm workers. Many hand make light work.
More kids with rifles help defend against Indian attacks, or against the McCoys
No birth Control.
Children died a lot. So to end up with three or four adult children, you sometimes needed 12.
People did not feel you "had" to have the things we now believe we cannot live without. Therefore, if you have a farm that will provide sufficient food, there is no reason not to have a big family.
They did not have the child rearing maxims that we have today. There was nothing wrong with having older kids raise younger ones. No college accounts to fund.
No one ever heard of a "carbon footprint" In fact, there were not enough people in the US, we needed more.
If you have 12 kids, you have abetter chance that two or three of them will actually like you and take care of you in your dotage.
People were more selfless. The "what is in it for me?" had not been born yet. Thus the idea of having kids was more appealing.
Perhaps people were more fit, fewer obese people, therefore more sexually attractive.
They did not have TV, internet, books on tape or DVDs. That had to have something to do in the evenings.
It appears most people were drunk most of the time. This lowers inhibitions and leads to more children.
I think the biggest issue is birth control. Having kids was not so much a choice then. They had to either choose to have more kids or stop having sex. From what I recall of being 18-30, the latter was simply not an option.
Depends... I use to know a lot of couples that married in the Depression era and almost all had only a single child and those with two were normally because the first born was a girl and they wanted to keep the family name...
The birth rate dropped during to depression, only to skyrocket after WW II. Now it's at its lowest level ever, I believe. (US)
Seriously, I can't imagine wanting to be pregnant 14 times...
I can't imagine being able to walk again after 14 pregnancies. You'd pretty much have to have every pregnancy consecutively, I feel like your hips might quit on you....or your innards would just one day slip on out and you'd be like well there goes my uterus on the sidewalk.
Seriously, though, reliable contraception is why. Pretty much everyone I know stopped having kids when they felt their ability to be a good parent was being stretched.
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