A new report from the U.S. Census Bureau shows that more women had their first child while living with an unmarried partner in the early 2020s compared to the early 1990s. The report, titled “Women’s Living Arrangements at First Birth,” examines how women’s living situations at the time of their first birth have changed over time, focusing on differences by education level and race or ethnicity.
The study found that fewer women had their first child while neither married nor cohabiting in 2020-2024 than in 1990-1994.
Education appears to play a significant role in these trends. Among women with at least a bachelor’s degree, the percentage who were married at their first birth increased from 74.4% in 1990-1994 to 84.5% in 2020-2024. In contrast, only 4.4% of these women were neither married nor living with a partner during this period, down from 14.4% three decades earlier.
For women without a bachelor’s degree, the share who were married at first birth declined from 58.6% to 40.6%. At the same time, cohabitation rates for this group rose from 19.2% to 34.8%.
The report also highlights changes among different racial and ethnic groups. In the early 1990s, Asian women were most likely to be married when they had their first child (81.7%), followed by White (71.8%), Hispanic (61.2%), and Black (31.5%) mothers.
By the early 2020s, there was a notable decrease among Hispanic mothers: only 43.9% were married at their first birth in this period, while marital rates for Asian, White, and Black mothers did not show significant statistical change.
Cohabitation became more common among both White and Hispanic mothers having their first child: it rose from 14.5% to 20.2% for White mothers and from 20.4% to 34.0% for Hispanic mothers between the two periods studied.
Further details about these findings can be found through resources such as the Current Population Survey June Fertility Supplement File and America Counts.
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