Immigration Cannot Solve the Fertility "Crisis"
... My colleagues and I at the Center for Immigration Studies recently put together a preliminary estimate that illegal immigrant [illegal alien invader] mothers gave birth to between 225,000 and 250,000 babies in 2023. That number is larger than the total number of births in any single state in 2023 except Texas and California. All of these children are automatically U.S. citizens, and through their birth they increase their parents’ chances of remaining in the country as well...
A low national fertility rate is indeed a problem—but immigration is not the solution. First, immigrant fertility is only slightly higher than native fertility. A standard measure called the total fertility rate (TFR) makes that clear. TFR is the number of children that women would have in their lifetimes if their rates of childbearing at each age matches today’s rates. In 2023, native-born Americans had a TFR of 1.73. Averaging in the immigrant rate of 2.19 raises the national TFR to only 1.80—still well short of replacement level.
Because their fertility is already low, immigrants have only a tiny effect on the national TFR despite constituting a record share of the U.S. population. In fact, doubling immigration would still raise the national TFR to only 1.87. To boost the TFR through immigration, we would need to recruit from the few places where fertility is still high: mainly sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East...
In a new report, I review the academic literature showing that the depressive effect of immigration on native fertility likely eliminates the small gain from the higher immigrant TFR...
On a cultural level, immigration adds to the ethnic diversity of a community, which scholars such as Robert Putnam have found decreases social trust. With less community engagement comes fewer opportunities for marriage and childbearing...
... policymakers should not ignore the important role that immigration restriction can also play.
Related
American women voluntarily achieved replacement-level fertility of 2.1 children per woman in 1972. Yet Congress, with unfathomable stupidity, mandated that mass immigration drive America's population to double.
We can't keep compounding physical growth forever within the limits of a finite nation.
The fertility "crisis" is not a crisis - it is a solution.
Immigration does not solve population decline - Refuting a common fallacy, Aporia, 28 February 2025.
Fertility and Population Momentum
