Wednesday, August 23, 2006

Do the Math: Birth Rates Benefit Conservative Movement

Republicans and conservatives can expect to fare better than Democrats and liberals long-term, according to a Syracuse University professor. Arthur Brooks, who teaches at the college's Maxwell School of Public Affairs, says the reason is simply arithmetic showing the conservatives will have significantly more babies.

The phenomenon could have a significant impact on the abortion debate and on election battles across the country.


Brooks says the political climate will change significantly in the next 15-20 years because conservatives, who are typically more pro-life, are having more children than liberals, who mostly back abortion.


"Simply put, liberals have a big baby problem: They're not having enough of them, they haven't for a long time, and their pool of potential new voters is suffering as a result," Brooks writes in an op-ed in the Wall St. Journal on Tuesday.


Brooks points to the 2004 General Social Survey showing that, on average, every group of 100 liberals has approximately 147 children while a typical group of 100 conservatives has 208 kids.
Brooks calls that a "fertility gap" and says the difference is about 41 percent...

Read the rest of this LifeNews story here.