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“The White House has been hearing out a chorus of ideas in recent weeks for persuading Americans to get married and have more children… One proposal shared with aides would reserve 30 percent of scholarships for the Fulbright program, the prestigious, government-backed international fellowship, for applicants who are married or have children…
“Another would give a $5,000 cash ‘baby bonus’ to every American mother after delivery. A third calls on the government to fund programs that educate women on their menstrual cycles — in part so they can better understand when they are ovulating and able to conceive.” New York Times
Both sides are skeptical that cash payments will meaningfully increase the birth rate:
“The cause of falling birthrates is not that American women suddenly want fewer children. According to Gallup, 45% of Americans say the ideal family size is three or more children, and women actually prefer larger families more than men do. The problem is that young men and women are failing to get married and start the families they want…
“If we want more births, we should be focused on helping young men and women get and stay married… What young men and women really need is affordable housing, affordable higher education (including trade schools), and a strong economy that can deliver good-paying jobs. Making it harder for young men to get lost in online pornography and gambling would help, too. Hopefully, the White House has more planned for its fertility agenda than fertility medals for mothers and menstrual cycle education programs for young women.”
Conn Carroll, Washington Examiner
“They are trying to usher in a Trump baby boom at the same time Musk and DOGE are slashing federal programs that help women have more kids. The list of cuts is long: DOGE has slashed funding to the Maternal and Child Health Bureau in the Department of Health and Human Services, the NIH’s National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and the Center for Disease Control’s Division of Reproductive Health…
“DOGE gutted the CDC’s Assisted Reproductive Technology team, which monitors the effectiveness of IVF programs across the country. DOGE has also laid off federal workers running programs for expectant mothers on Medicaid, canceled funding for maternal and postpartum care, and eliminated more than $12 billion from state health departments, including $2 billion earmarked for child vaccination programs. These shortsighted cuts will hardly help reverse declining birth rates.”
Mary Ellen Klas, Bloomberg
Other opinions below.
“Heritage [Foundation]’s ‘newest and boldest’ (their words) policy idea is… a tax credit for married couples with children that increases the more children the couple has. That would have been a new and bold idea in 1991, when 16-term Connecticut Democrat and longtime Child Tax Credit advocate Rep. Rosa DeLauro entered Congress. Heritage’s bold new idea is to do a version of a law that’s been on the books since 1997, except it would only benefit married parents…
“Another pro-natalist pitch put forth in the Times article is to pay women a $5,000 bonus to have babies. Which, again, sounds like a rehashing of the Child Tax Credit, this time increasing the size of the cash payout and making it single-use. By the way, in recent years, Republicans have had opportunities to permanently expand the child tax credit that already exists — and have blocked it at every turn…
“Could the issue be that women simply don’t know how to get pregnant? Their solution to this imagined problem is also a rerun: teaching young women about their bodies and menstrual cycles, perhaps in a classroom setting. Like, say, a school sex education program… They’re taking long-held center-left policy proposals, throwing a Western-centric, nationalistic sheen on them, and acting as if they’re newly discovered innovations.”
Erin Gloria Ryan, MSNBC
“Conspicuously absent from these proposals are any measures to address what actual American mothers describe as their urgent needs: namely paid family leave, affordable childcare or measures to address America’s soaring maternal mortality rate…
“That’s because the pro-natalist movement, for all its proponents’ insistence on the supposed demographic emergency facing the United States, is not really interested in making parenting easier or less burdensome for women.”
Moira Donegan, The Guardian
“The anti-fertility messages start young. Public school sex education does nothing to inform young men and women how fertility works. Educators actively teach, ‘Don’t get pregnant!’ The priority has been on contraceptive use and prevention of HIV/AIDS, not on basic female biology…
“Companies such as Tesla, Dick’s Sporting Goods, and even the superstore of the heartland Walmart are willing to shell out thousands of dollars for abortions, which is still cheaper than expanding their maternity (and paternity) care policies or providing in-office childcare…
“The bottom line is that $5,000 isn’t enough to encourage women to have more children when we, as a society, do not embrace children at all stages and engage women in seeking out partners to help them on their journey to and through motherhood… A present father is key too. It’s not just about incentivizing women; it’s about ensuring we’re incentivizing families.”
Elisha Krauss, Washington Examiner
“Maybe instead of a $5,000 baby bonus, Trump should consider a one-time tax break for newlyweds. Marriage is still the most reliable path to a thriving family, and federal policies should reflect that. Of course, money alone can’t solve this crisis. We also need a culture shift, a reawakening to the beauty and adventure of family life…
“Which brings me to a moment last week, halfway around the world, that somehow felt very close to home: Vice President JD Vance‘s X post of a perfectly imperfect photo of himself, his wife, Usha, and their squirming, squinting children on their official trip to India. The caption? ‘With three little kids staring into the sun, this was actually the best photo we got at the Taj Mahal today’ — followed by a laughing emoji. That’s the kind of positive, pro-family image Americans need to see more of: messy, real and beautiful.”
Bethany Mandel, New York Post
