THE DECLINING BIRTH RATE 135 



Fertility of Classes in Scotland According to Occupation 



Crofters 7 . 04 



Miners 7 . 01 



Agricultural laborers 6 . 42 



General laborers 6 . 29 



Ministers 4 . 33 



Advertisers and solicitors 3.92 



Physicians and surgeons 3.91 



The marriages considered are naturally more fertile than the 

 average, but they show the difference in the fertility of people of 

 different stations. 



A good deal of interesting data has been collected in the last 

 few years concerning the dwindling families of college graduates, 

 and the general conclusion quite uniformly arrived at, and one 

 from which the data leave no opportunity for escaping, is that the 

 college-bred elements of the population are not nearly reproducing 

 themselves. Several years ago President Elliott pointed with 

 alarm to the low birth rate of the graduates of Harvard Univer- 

 sity. J. C. Phillips, in the Harvard Graduates Magazine for 

 September, 1916, has presented a detailed study of the birth rates 

 of Harvard and Yale graduates. Taking the records of classes not 

 later than 1890, to insure dealing mainly with completed families, 

 he finds that about 25 per cent of the Harvard graduates never 

 marry; of those who do, 21 per cent are childless, and that more 

 than three children to a family is a rare occurrence. The decline 

 of the birth rate in Harvard and Yale is shown in the following 

 table: 



