Springville Herald | 1947-01-09 | Page 5 | Low Farm Birth Rate to Effect Cities

and the number of farmers at about the same rate the birth rate falls.) The farm birth rate is highest in the cut-over sections of the north, and through the southern states. Dr. O. E. Baker of the University of Maryland, who probably knows more about population trends than anyone else in the U. S., says: "If the present differential in birth rate continues, it is possible in a century that three-quarters of the nation will be descendants of the rural people of the south." Anyway, it is in these areas where the birth rate is still is high that Hill and Marshall say time, money, and effort should be put into in-to the improvement of rural life. LOW FARM BIRTH RATE TO EFFECT CITIES Modern farm women aren't having hav-ing as many babies as their mothers moth-ers or grandmothers did. The main reason is that they want it that way. So say George Hill and Douglas i Marshall, rural, sociologists at the ! University of Wisconsin, who have I been analyzing census figures to ' find out what's been happening to the farm baby crop. I The drop in the birth rate is greatest in the more commercial- ' ized farming sections, and generally gener-ally greater in older sections. Some of these areas may be getting to the point our cities have reached where theye are not raising enough children to maintain their own populations. That means that they will not have so many children to send to the cities and the cities depend on farms for population replacements. replace-ments. It also means that these sections may have to depend on other farming areas for their own replacements. (That might not happen if continued mechanization cuts down the number of farms