Dear Friends,
Thank you for following the work of the Strengthening Families Research Initiative (SFRI)!
This newsletter features a new SFRI research brief weighing in on the public conversation about which group of women is driving the decline in fertility – we show that recent declines in fertility and marriage have been broad-based across education groups.
This newsletter also highlights two recent papers by affiliated scholars; media coverage; updates from the legislative landscape; and some new readings that have caught our attention.
As always, we invite you to share your observations, feedback, and suggestions with us. And as we are aiming to grow this community, please forward this newsletter to anyone who might be interested in this work.
Sincerely,
Melissa
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Melissa S. Kearney
Director, Strengthening Families Research Initiative
Gilbert F. Schaefer Professor of Economics, University of Notre Dame
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Fertility Decline is Broad-Based Across Education Levels |
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Recent public discussion about falling birth rates centers around which group of women is driving the trend – working class women facing economic constraints or highly educated women pursuing professional success. In a new research brief, Melissa S. Kearney and Phillip Levine show that this framing is misguided.
Tracking fertility and marriage outcomes across birth cohorts from the 1970s through the 1990s, they find that although college educated women have fewer children on average, the trends are strikingly similar across all education groups. Regardless of educational attainment, fertility is lower and childlessness is higher among young women today than among women of the same age 10 to 15 years ago. The evidence points not to a group-specific phenomenon, but to a broad cohort-wide shift in how young adults are approaching family formation.
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| Local Marriage Markets and Economic Mobility |
Benjamin Goldman (Faculty Affiliate), Jamie Gracie, and Sonya Porter
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Family Focus: Where you grow up shapes who you marry. Growing up in a neighborhood with more economically diverse peers significantly increases the likelihood of marrying outside your economic class – the marriage market can therefore drive intergenerational inequality. Policies that promote economic integration in housing and communities matter for expanding mobility, not only because of access to better housing, but because of access to a wider range of potential partners
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| Why is Fertility So Low in High Income Countries? |
Melissa S. Kearney (Faculty Director) and Phillip Levine (Faculty Affiliate)
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Family Focus: Falling fertility is an important signal about what young adults are prioritizing and how they are experiencing modern life. Because the share of people opting out of parenthood is rising steadily across countries with various economic and policy environments, the common thread cannot be one single economic or policy factor but is instead reflective of a broader shift in what a good adult life is understood to look like. Parenthood is not necessarily less valued, but considered harder to integrate into expectations of modern life.
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Interview: U.S. Fertility Rate Drops to Another Record Low in 2025 |
CNN - Melissa Kearney (Faculty Director)
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| Interview: Can a state like California get to universal child care? These experts say yes |
LAist - Chloe Gibbs (Faculty Affiliate)
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Interview: Dad brains: How fatherhood rewires the male mind. |
BBC - Lee Gettler (Faculty Affiliate)
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Interview: As Americans are changing priorities, the birthrate is lower than ever
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CNN - Melissa Kearney (Faculty Director)
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Interview: The Two-Parent Privilege |
Book Club with Michael Smerconish - Melissa Kearney (Faculty Director)
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Interview: The Program That’s Turning Schools Around |
The Atlantic - Benjamin Goldman (Faculty Affiliate)
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We track evolving policy debates and reforms with meaningful implications for families across the country. In each issue we highlight a few key themes shaping family stability and economic security from a research-informed perspective.
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🏛️ Eliminating Marriage Penalties in the Tax Code |
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Utah lawmakers recently voted against a package of legislation this session aimed at removing marriage penalties embedded in the state's tax code. The bills would have limited tax breaks that benefit individuals who file by themselves but then disappear when married couples file jointly. The bill especially focused on removing barriers for low-income families who may experience benefit cliffs when they get married. While the bill failed in the House, a companion resolution urging Congress to take similar action at the Federal level is still on the floor.
More on the Bill | Read the Joint Resolution | Utah's family advantage
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⚖️ Growing Policy Conversation Around Boys and Men |
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Virginia seeks to establish the State's first advisory commission focused on the challenges facing boys and men. The legislation would create a permanent commission charged with advising the General Assembly on disparities in education, economic opportunity, health outcomes, and family life.
Virginia is joining a wave of state and federal action focused on strengthening outcomes for men and boys. Legislation has been proposed at the Federal level to create an office of men's health within HHS, and governors in Maryland, California, Michigan, and Connecticut have all launched initiatives to recruit male teachers in hopes of providing positive role models for boys.
Virginia's Advisory Commission | HHS Men's Health | Male Educators
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👪 Modernizing Foster Care for Aging-Out Youth
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Legislation that seeks to modernize the John H. Chafee Foster Care Program for Successful Transition to Adulthood have begun rolling into Congress. The Chafee Program has provided states with funding to help older youth in foster care transition to adulthood. The legislative package seeks to expand housing and educational support and workforce opportunities, while addressing barriers to accessing legal services and parenting supports for young people leaving the foster care system.
Chafee turned 25 in 2024, pushing Congress to examine ways to improve the program. More bills to reform Chafee are to be expected.
More on the Bill Package | Chafee at 25
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Research: Build the Market First, Then Fund Innovation |
Stanford Social Innovation Review - Ariel Kalil and Susan Mayer
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Research: Paid Caregiving Leave Policies and an Update on Paid Parental Leave |
NBER - Priyanka Anand, Tamar Matiashvili and Maya Rossin-Slater
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Research: The Empathy Channel in Fertility |
NBER - Sebastian Galiani and Raul A. Sosa
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Report: Place and Male Educational Attainment Gaps |
Economic Innovation Group - Sarah Eckhardt
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