Teen Pregnancy, Race, and How it all Comes Back to Contraceptives

There is a huge discrepancy between different races when it comes to teen births. According to 2014 data from Kids Count Data Center, the number of births per 1000 females aged 15-19 is 17 for non-Hispanic Whites, 35 for Blacks, and 38 for Hispanics/Latinos. The rate for both Blacks and Latinos is more than double that of whites (although you’d never guess that looking at the racial makeup of ‘teen pregnancy’ shows, but that’s a topic for another day).

Reasons for this trend are cultural/religious, financial, due to education, and maybe even geographical. For instance, Latinos have the highest overall teen birth rate, and Catholicism is very common amongst them. The Catholic Church is very against any form of contraceptive, let alone abortion. For that reason alone, I would expect any group with a large catholic population to have higher birth rates at any ages. Moreover, Latin culture is known to put a lot of importance on the family. Perhaps Latino teens are more likely to be pressured by parents, grandparents, etc. to start their own families. Another reason why minority ethnic groups/races have higher teen birth rates is because they might have more trouble being able to afford birth control or abortion. It’s no secret that for the better part of this country’s existence, it was a country ruled by and for white people. Between slavery, the Jim Crow era, and just a period of widespread white supremacy, white people have always had an advantage here. The effects of this are still very much visible today, and I don’t have the time nor energy to write out all of the specifics, but put simply, white people are much more likely to be economically advantaged than other races. This in turn means that, in general, schools in primarily black areas or primarily Latino areas probably aren’t funded anywhere close to as much as schools in primarily white areas, and as such might not have the funds for a quality sex education class. Lastly, geography likely plays a role. The proportion of black people is much higher in the Deep South (and the proportion of Latinos is very high in Texas as well), which is known to be very religious and socially conservative. Because of this, schools often aren’t even allowed to teach students about contraceptives and how to use them, instead just telling kids to be abstinent. Furthermore, abortion is VERY taboo. This culminates in high teen birth rates across the board.

This is important because it can help us figure out how to better solve the problem of teen pregnancy. By identifying the causes of teen pregnancy, especially the unique contributors for each ethnic group, we can develop better methods to lower the teen pregnancy rate across the board.

In reality, the specific causes of high teen pregnancy rates are very complex and probably different depending on the state, whether the teen lives in a rural or urban area, and more. If you look at the data on a state-by-state basis, you find that California has rates as follow: White-9, Black-24, and Latino-31. It is almost exactly the same for New York. Both of these states have huge urban centers and large Latino populations. Michigan, on the other hand, has these rates: White-16, Black-42, and Latino-32. Comparatively, Michigan is much more rural and with much smaller urban areas. This suggests that, although the issue follows a general trend, it is also highly localized.

Data retrieved from datacenter.kidscount.org