Posted on 11/26/2004 12:51:08 PM PST by Utmost Certainty
Found this pretty interesting, thought I'd share. Comment away.
Perhaps the biggest factor in the decline of white birthrates in the northeast has been the decline in influence of the Catholic Church. White Catholics in places like New York, Rhode Island and Massachussets used to have very high birth rates. The secularization of subsequent generations and the high cost of living in those areas has caused the birthrate of white "Catholics" to decline considerably.
How about plain and simple GREED. Here on Long Island, a baby is considered a speed bump in one's way to SUCCESS. It's NO conincidence that the fertility rates are in areas where the people are very religious. Talking about white fertility is probably a great way to get people to read the article, but it's really addressing a larger issue of the devaluation of children and the elimination of religion in people's lives.
I'd say your single paragraph is far superior in clarity and brevity.
This is to be expected. Religious individuals are more likely to have multiple children than the less religious. Socially conservative whites are the base of the GOP.
Students in West Virginia primarily go to public schools, students in Utah are more likely to go to private LDS schools.
I wasn't aware that the LDS church operated many private schools below the college level. I do know that there is a substantial number of Mormon homeschoolers. There are enough publishers that provide texts and materials for homeschoolers that Mormon families can select curricula without the Baptistic or Calvinist leanings of the largest providers of materials like A-Beka or Bob Jones.
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