The percentage of births to unmarried women in the United States has more than doubled since 1980, reaching 40 percent in 2023. This significant shift in family structure reflects changing societal norms and demographic trends over the past four decades. The rise in births outside of marriage has implications for family dynamics, social support systems, and public policy. Age and ethnicity factors in birth rates While the overall percentage of births to unmarried women has stabilized around 40 percent in recent years, birth rates vary significantly across age groups and ethnicities. Unsurprisingly, in 2023, women between 20 and 34 years old had the highest birth rate at 83 births per 1,000 women, while teenagers aged 15 to 19 had the lowest rate at 8 births per 1,000 women. Additionally, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander women had the highest fertility rate among all race/ethnicities in 2022, with approximately 2,237.5 births per 1,000 women, compared to the national average of 1,656.5 births per 1,000 women. Changing household structures The increase in births to unmarried women has contributed to evolving household structures in the United States. In 2023, there were approximately 15.18 million families with a single mother, a significant increase from previous decades. This trend aligns with the overall rise in births outside of marriage and suggests a growing need for support systems and policies that address the unique challenges faced by single-parent households.
This dataset includes number of births to unmarried women by age group in the United States since 1940.
Methods for collecting information on marital status changed over the reporting period and have been documented in:
• Ventura SJ, Bachrach CA. Nonmarital childbearing in the United States, 1940–99. National vital statistics reports; vol 48 no 16. Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. 2000. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr48/nvs48_16.pdf. • National Center for Health Statistics. User guide to the 2013 natality public use file. Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. 2014. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data_access/VitalStatsOnline.htm.
This dataset includes percent distribution of births to unmarried women by age group in the United States since 1970. Methods for collecting information on marital status changed over the reporting period and have been documented in: • Ventura SJ, Bachrach CA. Nonmarital childbearing in the United States, 1940–99. National vital statistics reports; vol 48 no 16. Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. 2000. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr48/nvs48_16.pdf. • National Center for Health Statistics. User guide to the 2013 natality public use file. Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. 2014. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data_access/VitalStatsOnline.htm. SOURCES CDC/NCHS, National Vital Statistics System, birth data (see http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/births.htm); public-use data files (see http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data_access/Vitalstatsonline.htm); and CDC WONDER (see http://wonder.cdc.gov/). REFERENCES Curtin SC, Ventura SJ, Martinez GM. Recent declines in nonmarital childbearing in the United States. NCHS data brief, no 162. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. 2014. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db162.pdf. Martin JA, Hamilton BE, Osterman MJK, et al. Births: Final data for 2015. National vital statistics reports; vol 66 no 1. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. 2017. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr66/nvsr66_01.pdf.
In 2023, just over 1.44 million births in the United States were among unmarried women. This statistic depicts the number of births to unmarried women in the United States from 1980 to 2023.
description:
This dataset includes birth rates for unmarried women by age group, race, and Hispanic origin in the United States since 1970.
National data on births by Hispanics origin exclude data for Louisiana, New Hampshire, and Oklahoma in 1989; for New Hampshire and Oklahoma in 1990; for New Hampshire in 1991 and 1992. Information on reporting Hispanic origin is detailed in the Technical Appendix for the 1999 public-use natality data file (see (ftp://ftp.cdc.gov/pub/Health_Statistics/NCHS/Dataset_Documentation/DVS/n....)
All birth data by race before 1980 are based on race of the child. Starting in 1980, birth data by race are based on race of the mother.
; abstract:This dataset includes birth rates for unmarried women by age group, race, and Hispanic origin in the United States since 1970.
National data on births by Hispanics origin exclude data for Louisiana, New Hampshire, and Oklahoma in 1989; for New Hampshire and Oklahoma in 1990; for New Hampshire in 1991 and 1992. Information on reporting Hispanic origin is detailed in the Technical Appendix for the 1999 public-use natality data file (see (ftp://ftp.cdc.gov/pub/Health_Statistics/NCHS/Dataset_Documentation/DVS/n....)
All birth data by race before 1980 are based on race of the child. Starting in 1980, birth data by race are based on race of the mother.
NCHS - Percent Distribution of Births to Unmarried Women by Age Group: United States
Description
This dataset includes percent distribution of births to unmarried women by age group in the United States since 1970. Methods for collecting information on marital status changed over the reporting period and have been documented in: • Ventura SJ, Bachrach CA. Nonmarital childbearing in the United States, 1940–99. National vital statistics reports; vol 48 no 16. Hyattsville… See the full description on the dataset page: https://huggingface.co/datasets/HHS-Official/nchs-percent-distribution-of-births-to-unmarried-w.
This dataset tracks the updates made on the dataset "NCHS - Births to Unmarried Women by Age Group: United States" as a repository for previous versions of the data and metadata.
This dataset tracks the updates made on the dataset "NCHS - Birth Rates for Unmarried Women by Age, Race, and Hispanic Origin: United States" as a repository for previous versions of the data and metadata.
Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
Analysis of ‘NCHS - Percent Distribution of Births to Unmarried Women by Age Group: United States’ provided by Analyst-2 (analyst-2.ai), based on source dataset retrieved from https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/52604432-17bd-454d-a5ba-1c76f318ddca on 27 January 2022.
--- Dataset description provided by original source is as follows ---
This dataset includes percent distribution of births to unmarried women by age group in the United States since 1970.
Methods for collecting information on marital status changed over the reporting period and have been documented in:
• Ventura SJ, Bachrach CA. Nonmarital childbearing in the United States, 1940–99. National vital statistics reports; vol 48 no 16. Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. 2000. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr48/nvs48_16.pdf. • National Center for Health Statistics. User guide to the 2013 natality public use file. Hyattsville, Maryland: National Center for Health Statistics. 2014. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data_access/VitalStatsOnline.htm.
SOURCES
CDC/NCHS, National Vital Statistics System, birth data (see http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/births.htm); public-use data files (see http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data_access/Vitalstatsonline.htm); and CDC WONDER (see http://wonder.cdc.gov/).
REFERENCES
Curtin SC, Ventura SJ, Martinez GM. Recent declines in nonmarital childbearing in the United States. NCHS data brief, no 162. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. 2014. Available from: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/databriefs/db162.pdf.
Martin JA, Hamilton BE, Osterman MJK, et al. Births: Final data for 2015. National vital statistics reports; vol 66 no 1. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics. 2017. Available from: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr66/nvsr66_01.pdf.
--- Original source retains full ownership of the source dataset ---
https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
This dataset includes number of births to unmarried women by age group in the United States since 1940. Methods for collecting information on marital status changed over the reporting
Age group level year wise unmarried birth data
Thanks to National Center for Health Statistics and CDC Picture credit to Wikipedia
This dataset tracks the updates made on the dataset "NCHS - Percent Distribution of Births to Unmarried Women by Age Group: United States" as a repository for previous versions of the data and metadata.
Number and percentage of live births, by marital status of mother, 1991 to most recent year.
The US Low Birth Weight Live Births dataset includes data about low birth weight and very low birth weight in the United States by detailed race and Hispanic origin of newborns between 1970 and 2015.
Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
Analysis of ‘NCHS - Nonmarital Birth Rates, by Age Group for All Women Age 15-44: United States, 1980-2013’ provided by Analyst-2 (analyst-2.ai), based on source dataset retrieved from https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/de9db554-d47f-4c66-9bf6-005345bb7e6c on 27 January 2022.
--- Dataset description provided by original source is as follows ---
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data-visualization/births-to-unmarried-women/index.htm
--- Original source retains full ownership of the source dataset ---
NCHS - Nonmarital Birth Rates, by Age Group for All Women Age 15-44: United States, 1970-2013
Description
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data-visualization/births-to-unmarried-women/index.htm
Dataset Details
Publisher: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Temporal Coverage: 1970/2013 Last Modified: 2025-04-21 Contact: National Center for Health Statistics (births@cdc.gov)
Source
Original data can be found at:… See the full description on the dataset page: https://huggingface.co/datasets/HHS-Official/nchs-nonmarital-birth-rates-by-age-group-for-all-w.
Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
License information was derived automatically
Analysis of ‘NCHS - Pregnancy and Live Birth Rates, by Marital Status and Race and Hispanic Origin: United States, 1990-2010’ provided by Analyst-2 (analyst-2.ai), based on source dataset retrieved from https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/66505059-4e29-462f-8b17-535dca794f0f on 26 January 2022.
--- Dataset description provided by original source is as follows ---
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data-visualization/births-to-unmarried-women/index.htm
--- Original source retains full ownership of the source dataset ---
This statistic shows the number of live births in Finland from 2010 to 2018, by marital status of the mother. Since 2015, both the number of unmarried women giving birth to live children and the number of married women giving birth decreased. In 2018, approximately 26,400 married and 21,200 unmarried women gave birth to live children.
description:
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data-visualization/births-to-unmarried-women/in...
; abstract:https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data-visualization/births-to-unmarried-women/in...
https://www.icpsr.umich.edu/web/ICPSR/studies/9409/termshttps://www.icpsr.umich.edu/web/ICPSR/studies/9409/terms
This collection contains information on live births in the United States during calendar year 1980. The natality data in this file are a component of the vital statistics collection effort maintained by the federal government. Geographic variables of residence for births include the state, county, city, population, division and state subcode, Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area (SMSA), and metropolitan-nonmetropolitan county. Other variables include the race and sex of the child, the age of the mother, mother's education, place of delivery, person in attendance, and live birth order. The summary variables in the file include total number of births occurring in the country, the ratio of births to married women, the ratio of births to unmarried women, number of live births by birth weight, total number of births to United States residents, births by attendant, and place of delivery.
The percentage of births to unmarried women in the United States has more than doubled since 1980, reaching 40 percent in 2023. This significant shift in family structure reflects changing societal norms and demographic trends over the past four decades. The rise in births outside of marriage has implications for family dynamics, social support systems, and public policy. Age and ethnicity factors in birth rates While the overall percentage of births to unmarried women has stabilized around 40 percent in recent years, birth rates vary significantly across age groups and ethnicities. Unsurprisingly, in 2023, women between 20 and 34 years old had the highest birth rate at 83 births per 1,000 women, while teenagers aged 15 to 19 had the lowest rate at 8 births per 1,000 women. Additionally, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander women had the highest fertility rate among all race/ethnicities in 2022, with approximately 2,237.5 births per 1,000 women, compared to the national average of 1,656.5 births per 1,000 women. Changing household structures The increase in births to unmarried women has contributed to evolving household structures in the United States. In 2023, there were approximately 15.18 million families with a single mother, a significant increase from previous decades. This trend aligns with the overall rise in births outside of marriage and suggests a growing need for support systems and policies that address the unique challenges faced by single-parent households.