In 2025, Milwaukee saw around 7,400 births — its lowest number of births on record, according to preliminary vital statistics from the Wisconsin Department of Health Services. The count marks 15% fewer births since 2020 and a nearly 29% decline from 2010.
John Johnson is a research fellow at the Marquette Law School Lubar Center, and he compiled this data in a recent blog post. He joins Lake Effect’s Joy Powers to discuss what this so-called "Baby Bust" could mean for Milwaukee.
While the the decline is in keeping with national and global trends, Johnson says it could mean closures of maternity wards and even schools in Milwaukee.
"It means that the conversations you hear about school consolidation, school closings at MPS — they've got to happen," he says. "There just aren't as many kids as there used to be, and all signs point to there being fewer in the future."
On the bright side, Johnson says fewer kids could spell shorter waitlists for daycares. But he worries that low enrollment and aging MPS buildings could pose other problems.
"My fear is that we'll be spending all this money maintaining buildings instead of educating kids — because the buildings were built for a time when we had many, many more students than we do now," he says.
One factor driving the baby bust is that young couples often move to the suburbs when starting a family, Johnson says. He says investment in public schools, housing and crime prevention can help make Milwaukee a place where folks want to raise a family.
"You're not really going to drive the birth rate up, particularly at a municipal level," he says. "But you can affect some of the reasons that so many families feel like, when they're planning on having a kid ... that now's the time they need to leave the city."
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