A Red State Baby Boom

Going back to recent election cycles, some observers have noted that there is a distinct fertility gap between the Bush/Kerry, McCain/Obama election maps.  “Red” states that tend to vote for Republicans have fertility rates that exceed replacement, whereas many Democratic blue states do not.  This has led some to conclude and worry that “conservatives are outbreeding liberals.”
 
The difference is rather profound.  According to one analysis, “conservative non-Hispanic women have 26 percent more children than liberal white women.”  Moreover, very conservative families have 45 percent more children than the very liberal.   One interesting analysis, written before our current debate over amnesty and immigration, notes repeatedly that the only thing which can counter these numbers for Democrats over time is the influx of minority voters.
 
Not long ago, liberal alternative media sites made a big deal out of what they saw as hypocrisy of family values in red states. They tried to make a big deal out of red states having higher rates of out-of-wedlock births.   They claimed that blue state families walked the walk of values better than red state families who just talked the talk because liberal states had fewer teen pregnancies.  These liberal media sites also used this disparity as an example of the failure of abstinence education as opposed to the liberal approach of passing out contraceptives to children.
 
A deeper look at the Red State/Blue State out-of-wedlock birth numbers has a different reality than the drive-by approach taken by most liberal commentators.  It seems that in many blue states, teen pregnancies are up to 50 percent less likely to come to full term.  For example, the abortion rate in New York is twice as high as it is in conservative Texas.  Liberal Massachusetts has an abortion rate three times higher than conservative Utah. 
 
While some red state numbers may appear to betray family values, what is really happening is that in a sex-saturated culture, with all of its influence and consequences, red state residents are still much less likely to rely upon abortion.