The Women Defying America’s Birth Dearth: An Interview With Catherine Pakaluk
24th March 2024
Until I read Catherine Pakaluk’s fascinating new book, Hannah’s Children: The Women Quietly Defying the Birth Dearth, I was unaware that I had grown up in what is now considered to be a “large family.” I am the oldest of five children, but my father came from a family of 11 and my mother was one of 7. In the rural Reformed church communities where I live, a family of five children is considered “average” rather than “large.” But communities with large families are now a social aberration. With the exception of a few religious pockets, the birth rate is cratering in every single Western country.
Pakaluk, a social scientist and mother of eight, decided to investigate why, as small families, “DINKs” (dual income, no kids), and overt anti-natalism become the norm, some 5% of American women choose to have five or more children. She traveled across the country and interviewed 55 college-educated mothers with large families to ask them why they chose to have children and why they chose to have more. Pakaluk also explains why, despite concerted efforts at pro-natalist policies by governments, none have successfully boosted the birth rate to replacement level.