Economic factors and the pursuit of higher education and a career were cited as two reasons for a continuing decline in the birth rate in Hawai'i.

New U.S. Census Bureau data on the fertility of American women released yesterday indicate that females in Hawai'i ages 15 to 50 who gave birth within the previous 12 months did so at a rate of 54 per 1,000 women in 2006, compared with 61 per 1,000 in 2000.

That mirrors the national trend of 55 per 1,000 women in 2006, down from 65 per 1,000 at the start of the decade, according to the census estimates.

"People are putting off having kids in these tougher economic times. More women also are going to school, and have higher career aspirations and delay having kids or are having fewer kids," said Sylvia Yuen, head of the University of Hawai'i Center on the Family.

She said she also believes school, faith-based and other programs that try to forestall teen pregnancy or emphasize the responsibilities of parenthood are "beginning to play out" in the data showing lower fertility in women under age 30.

Hawai'i ranked 27th nationwide in terms of fertility, with 54 recent births per 1,000 women. Utah topped the list, with 83 per 1,000.

The rate of recent births for Hawai'i women ages 15 to 19 was 20 per 1,000 in 2006, compared with 37 per 1,000 six years earlier.

For women ages 20 to 34, the rate also went down, from 118 per 1,000 women in 2000, to 92 per 1,000 in the most recent report.

But the number increased for women ages 35 to 50 who may have delayed having children in favor of education or career and "feel that now is the time; the clock is ticking," Yuen said.

Census data for 2006 show 30 recent births per 1,000 women in that older age group. In 2000, it was 23 per 1,000.

Forty-four percent of Hawai'i women ages 15 to 44 were childless, compared with 45 percent nationally, according to the 2006 data. Hawai'i ranked 29th among all states and the District of Columbia in that regard.

The District of Columbia and Minnesota were at the top of the list, with 64 percent and 55 percent, respectively. West Virginia has the lowest percentage of women in that age group who were childless, at 36 percent.

Although Hawai'i's overall fertility rate was similar to the national figure, the state differed when it came to educational attainment and fertility. Nationally, those with a graduate or professional degree had the highest fertility, 67 per 1,000 women ages 15 to 50. In Hawai'i, high school graduates had the highest fertility, 68 per 1,000.

That can be attributed in part to the Islands' large number of military families and Native Hawaiians, according to research and statistics officer Eugene Tian of the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism.

Women in both groups generally tend to have children at a younger age and have lower rates of higher education, he said.

Census data also reveal that of the 16,882 women who had a recent birth in Hawai'i, 34 percent were separated, widowed, divorced or never married at the time of the census survey, up from 31 percent in 2000.

Nationally, 36 percent of American women who had a recent birth were unmarried.

Yuen said a mother's unmarried status does not necessarily mean she doesn't have a partner or support from extended family.

"The trend for people to co-habit has increased through the years, and maybe what we're seeing now is some of those couples having kids," she said.

The data also estimate that 62 percent of Hawai'i women with a recent birth were in the labor force. Nationally, it's 57 percent.

Foreign-born mothers — mostly Asian — accounted for 22 percent of recent births in Hawai'i, compared with 20 percent nationally. Foreign-born moms had slightly higher fertility levels than American-born women, but the latter group was more than twice as likely to be unmarried than foreign-born mothers.

Tian said that is because immigrants usually come to the United States as a family.

The data show women at lower income levels have higher fertility nationally and at the state level. In Hawai'i, fertility for women living below the poverty level — $20,444 for a family of four — was 78 per 1,000. That compares with 63 per 1,000 for women at or 199 percent above the poverty level, and 50 per 1,000 for women at 200 percent or more above the poverty level.

Maui County had the highest fertility in the state at 60 per 1,000 women ages 15 to 50, followed by Big Island, 59 per 1,000; and Honolulu, 52 per 1,000. Kaua'i was not included in the study, which looked at areas with a population of 65,000 or greater.