This report profiles current fertility patterns of American women and is based on data collected in the June 2002 supplement to the Current Population Survey (CPS). Unlike annual fertility statistics compiled from birth certificates by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), data collected in the CPS are from two questions asked of women 15 to 44 years old: (1) the number of children they have ever had, and (2) the date of birth of their last child. The report provides current estimates of fertility and out-of-wedlock childbearing, highlighting differences among women by race, ethnicity, and nativity status. Historical data from previous surveys are also used in this report to show the fluctuations since 1976 in the labor force participation rate of women with infants (children under 1 year of age), and to illustrate how women completing their childbearing today differ from women a generation earlier, whose principal childbearing years occurred during the Baby Boom (1946 to 1964).

Current Population Survey