Mothers by the Numbers

Info about mothers from the Census Bureau

How Many Mothers

4.1 million

Number of women between the ages of 15 and 50 who gave birth in the past 12 months.

53%

Percentage of 15- to 44-year-old women who were mothers in 2010.

81%

Percentage of women who had become mothers by age 40 to 44 as of 2010. In 1976, 90 percent of women in that age group had given birth.

2,449

The total fertility rate or estimated number of total births per 1,000 women in Utah in 2010 (based on current birth rates by age), which led the nation. At the other end of the spectrum is Rhode Island, with a total fertility rate of 1,630.5 births per 1,000 women.

20%

Percentage of all women age 15 to 44 who have had two children. About 47 percent had no children, 17 percent had one, 10 percent had three and about 5 percent had four or more.

89.7%

Percentage of all children who lived with their biological mothers in 2012. About 1.2 percent of all children lived with a stepmother.

Recent Births

3.954 million

Number of births registered in the United States in 2011. Of this number, 329,797 were to teens 15 to 19 and 7,651 to women age 45 to 49.

25.4

Average age of women in 2010 when they gave birth for the first time, up from 25.2 years in 2009. The increase in the mean age from 2009 to 2010 reflects, in part, the relatively large decline in births to women under age 25.

29.2%

The percentage of mothers who had given birth in the past 12 months who had a bachelor's degree or higher and 84 percent of mothers have at least a high school diploma.

Jacob and Sophia

The most popular baby names for boys and girls, respectively, in 2011.

Stay-at-Home Moms

5 million

Number of stay-at-home moms in 2012 — statistically unchanged from 2009, 2010 and 2011-- down from 5.3 million in 2008. In 2012, 24 percent of married-couple family groups with children under 15 had a stay-at-home mother, up from 21 percent in 2000. In 2007, before the recession, stay-at-home mothers were found in 24 percent of married-couple family groups with children under 15, not statistically different from the percentage in 2012.

$236,500; 321,200; and 93,600

Median home value of owner-occupied units in Currituck, Dare and Hyde counties, respectively.

Compared with other moms, stay-at-home moms in 2007 were more likely:

Younger (44 percent were under age 35, compared with 38 percent of mothers in the labor force).
Hispanic (27 percent, compared with 16 percent of mothers in the labor force).
Foreign-born (34 percent, compared with 19 percent of mothers in the labor force).
Living with a child under age 5 (57 percent, compared with 43 percent of mothers in the labor force).
Without a high school diploma (19 percent versus 8 percent of mothers in the labor force).

Employed Moms

827,907

Number of child care centers across the country in 2010. These included 75,695 child day care services employing 859,416 workers and another 752,212 self-employed people or other businesses without paid employees. Many mothers turn to these centers to help juggle motherhood and careers.

62.1%

Percentage of women age 16 to 50 who had a birth in the past 12 months who were in the labor force.

Single Moms

10.3 million

The number of single mothers living with children younger than 18 in 2012, up from 3.4 million in 1970.

5.9 million

Number of custodial mothers who were owed child support in 2009.

36%

Percentage of births in the past 12 months that were to women age 15 to 50 who were unmarried (including divorced, widowed and never married women).

In 2011, 407,873 mothers who had a birth in the past 12 months were living with a cohabiting partner.

Mothers Remembered

16,182

Number of florist establishments nationwide in 2010. The 70,575 employees in floral shops across our nation will be especially busy preparing, selling and delivering floral arrangements for Mother's Day.