Study ties iPhone rollout to up to half of US birth-rate decline

A new economic working paper argues that the spread of the iPhone and other smartphones helped drive a large share of the long U.S. decline in births after 2007. Economist Caitlin Myers of Middlebury College found birth rates fell faster in places where AT&T's network gave people early access to the iPhone, which was exclusive to the carrier from 2007 to 2011. The paper estimates smartphone diffusion accounted for 33% to 52% of the decline in the general fertility rate among women ages 15 to 44 over that period. The steepest drops were among teenagers and women ages 20 to 24. The study has not been peer-reviewed and argues smartphones may have reduced in-person socializing while increasing access to pornography and contraception information.