Maybe what I am going to say might sound rude and insensitive; I am trying to put words carefully, so bear with me.

What kind of a person/family would make a decision to have or not have children based on economy? We all know economy gets better or worse in cycles, if things are good today, they will get relatively worse tomorrow….if things are bad today, they will get relatively better tomorrow.
Making a decision to have a child simply based on current economy makes no sense. Is this a correlation observed by the demographers or do you guys think that it is a causation i.e. where women/couples are deciding not to have children based on S&P 500?

It is not like civilization is going to end….and animals are going to come in and eat your kids. There will still be schools, parks and fun things to do. Maybe you have to get a little colder in winter and warmer in summer to save money. Maybe you have to cut vacations to save on gas bill, but deciding not to have children?

On the other hand, say, once you have a child and the economy gets worse what would you do? Return the child back to where he/she came from? Or do all couples who make children are doing it under assumption that the economy only keeps getting better from that point of time?

I hope the demographers are using this correlation to derive causation and are wrong with the reasoning. If not, it reflects worse on thinking process of American couples/women of child bearing age.

pri_dk, thanks for posting this. Interesting chart. By the way, I could also interpret the chart as migration from farmlands to cities. The green bubbles are essentially where the large metro areas are today irrespective of coasts or inland.