California was near the top of the list in a national decline in births in 2008. A new federal report shows California's birth rate dropped 2.6 percent from the previous year.
Mark Mather is a demographer with the non-profit Population Reference Bureau. He says the nation saw a big drop in birth rates during the Depression. And there was a decline in the high inflation years of the 1970's.
Mather believes the current recession may be having a similar effect in California.
"California was hit particularly hard by the housing crisis, unemployment is rising, so I would think that people are feeling a little bit less optimistic about the future, and might be having second thoughts about starting a family right now," said Mather.
Last year, California had 14,500 fewer births than in 2007.
