Just curious if anyone knows whether there was a noticeable baby boom or bust in the year after Sept. 11, 2001? Locally, regionally or nationally?
Snopes says no.
Really there was NO difference? I would have to image 3000 people dying all within a small area have to impact somehow. Than again those people lived all over the greater new york area, so they are probably more spread out.
EDIT: Where any pregnant women killed? Did they count the death of the unborn baby as well? I am just curious because I know you can be tried for two murders if you kill an unborn baby and its mother.
3,000 people out of 300,000,000? That would result in a change in the pregnancy rate of just 0.001% which is smaller than a rounding error on this kind of thing. And that rate assumes (incorrectly) that the 3,000 were an average sample of the US population by gender, age and ethnicity.
Even 3,000 out of the greater New York area is just a tiny drop in the bucket.
People want the numerical significance of the attacks to equal the emotional significance… but it’s just not true.
In 2001, more than 42,000 Americans were killed in car accidents, probably around 20,000 died of flu, and about 15,000 were murdered. 9/11 killed fewer Americans than any of those other causes.
By comparison, World War II killed about 400,000 Americans over four years.
No, they lived all over the country. Some of the people on those flights to California were on their way home. And don’t forget the people who were killed at the Pentagon. Most of them (other than the people on the plane) probably lived in the DC area.
Not to mention that most of them probably had all of the kids they were going to have anyway.
This paper says that there was a birthrate surge in Manhattan
http://paa2010.princeton.edu/papers/101660
Actually, if you look at the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports, they are careful to note that the September 11 attacks are NOT included in the totals for “Murder and non-negligent manslaughter”. Not including the 9/11 victims, there were slightly over 16,000 victims of murder or non-negligent manslaughter in the United States in 2001, an increase of several hundred victims compared to 2000. The homicide rate for 2001 was 5.6 per 100,000 (an uptick of about 1.5% as compared to 2001; the rate of course takes into account both the total number of victims and the growth of the total U.S. population). In general, the '00’s show a moderately steep increase in total homicide victims until 2006 (following the extremely steep decline in homicide victims which started in 1993), and a much slighter increase in the homicide rate (since the population was also increasing), following the very steep decline in the homicide rate from 1993 to 2000 (during which period it fell from 9.5 to 5.5 per 100,000, which is a really stunning reversal of an increase in the U.S. murder rate that had been at historically high levels for 20 or 30 years before then).
However, if you DO include the 2,977 victims of the 9/11 attacks (not including the hijackers themselves) in the totals for murder and non-negligent homicide for the year 2001, then 2001’s homicide rate jumps to 6.7 per 100,000–an over 20% increase compared to 2000–and the rate then falls over 15% back down to 5.6 for 2002. On a chart of either total homicide victims, or of the homicide rate, 2001+9/11 makes a very noticeable sharp peak.
So, yes, in a country the size of the United States, the total number of victims of 9/11–however much of a tragedy the attacks were–were a demographic drop in the bucket. But even in a country as large–and as prone to violence–as the United States, the September 11 attacks actually do make a noticeable impact on the murder rate if included.