Employers should expect future labor headaches as US birth rate falls again

The US’s birthrate problem isn’t going away anytime soon.

Recently released birth data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirms that the US once again saw a decline in fertility last year. The US recorded 3,606,400 live births in 2025, 1% fewer than the year prior. The general fertility rate, at 53.1 births per 1,000 females aged 15 to 44, fell 1% year over year as well.

The fertility rate in the US has declined for nearly two decades now, after peaking in 2007 with 69.5 births per 1,000 girls and women in that 15 to 44 age range. As more baby boomers reach retirement age, the decline in fertility means there are fewer workers entering the workforce to replace them, which will worsen labor shortages in the future. It’s a challenge impacting many other countries, including those in East Asia and Europe.

Making matters worse. The US has historically fared better than other countries experiencing declining birth rates, because it’s had a strong inflow of immigrants who’ve helped grow the population, and thus the labor supply. The second Trump administration’s aggressive deportation campaign against immigrants has exacerbated these pain points in the US labor market.

“Traditionally, we have had a more diverse population and we have relied a lot on immigration, that may be one of the reasons our fertility rate is doing better” compared to other countries, Audrey Guo, an assistant professor of economics at Santa Clara University’s Leavey School of Business, told HR Brew. However, she noted that “a lot of the current administration’s stance on immigration is not so positive, and so that could actually hurt population growth and fertility rates as well.”

A blip? Women and girls may also be delaying childbirth until later in life, which could result in a rebound in birth rates in a few years, Philip Cohen, a sociology professor at the University of Maryland, told the New York Times. Fertility rates for teenagers and women aged 20–29 fell between 2024 and 2025, while women aged 30 and older were the only groups to also see an increase in birth rates during that same period.

This can come with its own silver lining. While women experience stunted career growth after having children and likely delay childbearing to pursue sustainable employment, children born to parents with privileges like higher education and higher incomes do experience better outcomes.

“Mothers having births at a later age, I would argue that that is probably actually a positive outcome, just because the financial resources that children have available to them as they’re growing up has a very strong impact on their future and adult outcomes,” Guo said. At the same time, though, she noted that women who have children later in life may also have fewer children than prior generations, which will still impact overall birth rates.

Can employers help? Experts generally agree that significant policy changes are needed to reverse the US’s falling birth rates, including those focused on lowering the cost of living, and providing affordable childcare and paid family leave—both of which the US lacks.

Employers, however, can help on a smaller scale. In South Korea, which has seen its birth rates rise for two years in a row, employers have experimented with benefits intended to help employees have children, including onsite daycare, extended parental leave, and bonuses when workers have children. In the US, employers can offer paid family leave or subsidized childcare benefits, Guo noted.

“That would be a policy that even if we aren’t able to get policy makers to pass at the national or even local level, maybe employers can try to support that in their own way,” she said.