The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that there were 4% fewer U.S. births in 2020 than in 2019, an acceleration of a long, slow decline. The report keeps getting picked up in the news, in part because conventional wisdom has generally been that it’s important for generations to replenish themselves.

Dan discusses this report, how we think about birth rates and the economy, and whether a country can sustain its economy without sustaining its birth rate with Axios business reporter Hope King and with report coauthor and CDC statistician and demographer Brady Hamilton.