They’re also likely receiving substantial resources from the federal government. Time to shut it down.

Unfortunately, many economists have become weirdly incurious about the causes of the baby boom. And there is a very strong tendency among economists to believe that higher level of immigration are appropriate if native fertility is low.

We're going to have to relearn Easterlin.

If Easterlin’s theory is right, a new baby boom would require young families to feel they’re better off than previous generations and it would require a restrictive immigration policy.

Here's a link to the chapter from which that excerpt is taken.
www.nber.org/system/files...

Here's how Easterlin put it.

But there's a catch. The high demand for labor amid low supply would draw in high levels of immigration unless measures were taken to prevent that. That, in turn, would counteract the pressures leading to higher fertility.

So immigration would depress fertility.

So fertility could be expected to work in cycles. Low fertility would lead to a small generational cohort, which would raise the incomes and prospects for the members of that generation so long as the economy was expanding and demand for labor was growing. That would lead to higher fertility.

Easterlin argued that young adults’ decisions about family size are shaped by their expectations and their relative economic well-being compared to their parents. Post-war prosperity made larger families feel achievable again.

Economist Richard Easterlin’s theory connects the baby boom to the Great Depression and the post-war economic boom. A generation raised in deprivation saw rising incomes and optimism after the war—and believed they could afford the family sizes they dreamed of.

Yet after WWII, birth rates exploded. Couples married earlier, had more kids, and embraced the ideal of a larger family. This shift caught many off guard. What explains such a dramatic reversal?

The baby boom wasn’t just surprising—it defied decades of declining birth rates. In the early 20th century, experts assumed urbanization, education, and economic growth would mean fewer kids. Families would prioritize quality of life over quantity.