A report published Monday by the National Marriage Project, a research initiative at U. Virginia, found that marriage and the national economy affect each other.

The project monitors the cultural and social forces affecting marriage to strengthen the institution of marriage, said Bradford Wilcox, assistant sociology professor and project director at UVA.

The report found that the institution of marriage is stronger when people feel more confident with their financial prospects, he said.

Wilcox pointed to the economy as an explanation for the growing gap between the fertility rate and the American ideal fertility rate, which is based on the desires expressed by 18- to 46-year-old Americans. The American ideal fertility rate is 2.66 children compared to the real fertility rate of 1.91.

The quality of family lives and fertility rates are declining, according to the report.

The report uses statistics drawn from U.S. census records, data from the United Nations and consumer expenditure data from the U.S. Department of Labor and shows that the decline in fertility rates and quality of family lives have real life implications for the national economy, particularly sectors like childcare, health care and juvenile products.

“We are finding that there is an association between getting married and having kids and spending more money in seven sectors of the economy,” Wilcox said.

Wilcox highlighted European economies, like Greece and Italy, which are currently suffering from financial crises.

“[They are] experiencing difficulty in fiscal health because they’ve had relatively low fertility rates,” he said.

The report says marriage could be used as a tool for improving the quality of human capital.

“Social science indicates that kids do better on average when they’re raised with married parents,” Wilcox said.

Tracey O’Donnell, secretary general of the Social Trends Institute, a research center which released the report, said she hopes the report will increase awareness of the importance of marriage.

“The report should serve to, at the very least, stimulate a cultural debate about the importance of marriage and may serve to influence the direction public policy takes on these issues,” she said.
O’Donnell is confident of the report’s ability to educate public policymakers and citizens.

“The report shows that marriage does indeed matter: to children, to individual adults, to communities, to countries, to businesses, to economies,” O’Donnell said.