Fertility and Mortality in the United States

Michael Haines

Economic History
Labor and Demographic Economics

Article

Every modern, economically developed nation has experienced the demographic transition from high to low levels of fertility and mortality. America is no exception. But America was also distinctive. First, its fertility transition began in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century at the latest. Second, the fertility rate in America commenced its sustained decline long before that of mortality. Third, both these processes were influenced by America's very high level of net in-migration and also by the significant population redistribution to frontier areas and later to cities, towns, and suburbs.