PREDICTING CHILDLESSNESS FOR RECENT COHORTS OF AMERICAN WOMEN

Over 50% of white women now in the midst of the childbearing years have never borne a child. These levels of childlessness for women in their 20s are the highest ones in a time series that spans most of the twentieth century. Will postponed parenthood be translated into very high levels of permanent childlessness? Or will these cohorts 'catch-up' with a late fertility flurry in their 30s and 40s? We examine three projection strategies: one using women's stated fertility expectations, a second relying on the patterns of previous cohorts, and a third which posits that current rates will persist into the future. The predictive validity of these different projection strategies are tested with data for the 1980-87 period. We show that the projection based on current period rates performs well. Further, we argue that it better captures the first birth process than other models. We forecast levels of 20% childless for cohorts of white women born in the early 1960s. Recent trends for nonwhites are very different than those for whites; levels of 4% are forecast for nonwhite women.