Once you start a slogan and it catches on, it morphs and balloons. Make America Great Again (MAGA) is an example: Mean-Angry-Grumpy-Always, Mentalizing About Government Abuse, Minimizing Achievements by Governmental Agencies, etc. One that caught my eye recently was Make America Pregnant Again (Jo Ellison, Financial Times, April 25, 2025). She wrote about the historic low in American fertility, falling to 1.6 children per woman and well below the 2.1 replacement level needed to maintain the US population, without immigration. Since 2007, the United States has remained below replacement level fertility. The Great Recession accelerated this trend which continued even though the US economy improved.
There are many reasons to be concerned about the fertility rate. First, the declining US fertility rate means that less workers will support the retired US population. The pyramidal structure of Social Security and Medicare will therefore require more funding, in the form of higher tax rates, or a higher retirement age, from less workers. A declining population demands less goods and services which can produce deflation as older Americans die. The current governmental policy on deporting illegal immigrants will further expose the underlying declining US fertility rate.
The lower fertility rate is really a micro-level problem; it is found within the households of families. Young couples are having children later, primarily due to economic and lifestyle choices. Recently, I got my hair cut and learned that the person cutting my hair was the seventh child in a family of twelve children. My hair cutter bore two children, and her mother wanted her to have more children. My hair cutter said that children were expensive to raise. Her mother replied: “You have plenty of tortillas and beans; that is all you need.”
Elon Musk does not have to worry about his cost of raising children since he is a billionaire. Officially, he has fourteen children from multiple women. He is a committed pronatalist who pays women to father his children and advocates surrogates. His fees vary from one-time, multi-million-dollar payments to monthly support checks until his child is an adult. He now parades his children during political events and imaginatively named them. His solution to the declining fertility rate is one that only the very wealthy can afford. His pronatal approach is certainly radical and does not align with Christian values. Children need more than financial support; they need both parents to be physically and emotionally involved in their daily lives.
The current administration’s proposed pronatal approach is to give married couples incentives to conceive. For example, the government promotes a baby bonus of $5,000 to married couples who have a baby. Other ideas, such as educational grants, are being considered. I refer to these types of incentives as Fiscal Fertility Incentives (FFI). Perhaps a new cabinet-level department can be added now that the Education Department has been gutted?
A third approach is to honor motherhood, similar to the American Gold Star Mothers of lost sons and daughters in the service of the US Armed Forces. This proposal includes a “US Motherhood” medal with stars designating the number of children bore to married couples having more than two children. Mothers with five or more children receive a cluster of stars like a five-star general. Russia and Germany had similar wartime promotions awards.
I believe that married couples should go back to basics. Children are to be treasured and not conceived based on governmental incentives, billionaire surrogates, or decorations. Children need to grow up knowing that they are loved because they are made in the image of God. They are not an economic transaction, bur a gift from God. Raising children is not easy but well worth the physical, emotional and financial commitments given in love by their parents.
Parenthood not only allow for humanity to continue, but there are additional benefits. Self-centered parents soon realize after the birth of their first child that their inward focus must reverse outwardly towards another needy person — their child. Priorities are adjusted and individualistic activities are replaced by family priorities.
Parenting rewards outnumber the personal sacrifices. Seeing your child take their first steps, enter their school for the first time, participate in sports, and confidently leave home, are worth all the sacrifices parents somehow manage. I did not need financial incentive or medals to become a parent. Memories are my rewards.
Time moves quickly as we age. Since 1985, I have been a parent, and parenthood never ends. Even as adults, my children are still my children. I now have three grandchildren, one who is a teenager. Someday, my children may take care of me when I am no longer able. This is the circle of life created and sustained by God.
For the utilitarian, parenting has a positive rate-of-return. You can’t calculate it like an ongoing business. Parental returns are buried deep within your soul and accrue daily through the life of a child. Once the younger generations realize the true parental benefits, the billionaire solution and the governmental fertility programs won’t be inacted, and the downward fertility rates should reverse. Forest Witcraft (1894–1967), a professional Scout trainer, said it best:
“A hundred years from now it will not matter what my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in, or the kind of car I drove. Bur the world may be different because I was important in the life of a boy [child].” (from Within My Power)
