As greater economic security was achieved, birth rates began to fall substantially. Many explanations have been offered for this decline, but we might sum them up as a reversal in cultural attitudes toward children. In the more affluent society generated by increased freedom and consequent industrialization, children were no longer regarded merely as a means of insuring the survival of the older generation. On the contrary, increasing resources were expended on the care and education of the young. The widespread attitude that children have worth and dignity as individuals is, to a considerable extent, a modern invention, which inhabitants of precapitalistic societies must dismiss as an unaffordable luxury.

This same demographic transition has been regularly observed in other countries as they undergo the industrialization associated with the liberalization of markets. In virtually all cases, a decline is noted not only in mortality rates, but also in birth rates. (More recently, the birth-rate decline has doubtless been accelerated by new methods of birth control.) Furthermore, as the well-being of the younger generation becomes a preeminent concern, a birth-rate pattern arises that is basically opposite to that of preindustrial countries. In precapitalistic, preindustrial countries, harsh economic times increase the pressure toward high birth rates. In relatively free, industrialized countries, in contrast, birth rates are lowest during those periods when the economy is less prosperous. In the United States, for instance, they dipped significantly during the Great Depression.