Declining fertility in a religious isolate: the Hutterite population of Alberta, Canada, 1951-1971.

Abstract

A demographic profile of the Alberta Hutterite population is presented from data of the 1971 Census of Canada. Changes in the age and sex distribution, and marital status are demonstrated by comparisons with the North American Hutterite population of 1951 described by Eaton and Mayer (1953). Several estimates of fertility, based on the 1971 age and sex distribution, indicate that the Hutterite crude birth rate declined from 45.9 per thousand in 1950 to 38.4 per thousand in 1971. Additional estimates indicate a similar decrease in age-specific fertility of Hutterite women. A number of factors which may have contributed to the decline in fertility include a later age at marriage, an increase in the frequency of never-married women of reproductive age, and lower marital fertility. It is estimated that the Hutterite mean age at marriage has risen from 22.0 years to 24.9 years for females; and from 23.5 years to 26.0 years for males between 1950 and 1971. The percentage of Hutterite women over the age of 30 who remained unmarried rose from 5.4% in 1950 to 14.8% in 1971. The Hutterite rate of natural increase declined from 41.5 per thousand in 1950 to about 35.5 per thousand in 1971.

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