US Counties With the Highest Share of Births to Unmarried Women
1,621 US counties ranked by share of births to unmarried women, from highest to lowest. First are Calhoun County, GA (100%), Clay County, GA (100%) and Glascock County, GA (100%). The middle one of the 1,621 has 35.8%.
What this measures
Of women who gave birth in the past year, the percentage who were not married: never married, widowed or divorced. A separated woman counts as married. The middle county is 31.8%. It is a share of women who gave birth, not of all women, so it says nothing about how many births there were. Source: Census ACS 5-year.
For most measures, a national ranking mostly sorts places by income and by how urban they are. Each county’s own page compares it with the 50 counties most like it instead, which is often the fairer view.
The 100 highest counties
Every state, highest first
Each state’s own published figure, not an average of its counties.
| Rank | State | % |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Puerto Rico | 61.1% |
| 2 | Louisiana | 46.3% |
| 3 | Mississippi | 45.5% |
| 4 | New Mexico | 43.2% |
| 5 | District of Columbia | 41.4% |
| 6 | South Carolina | 38.6% |
| 7 | Alabama | 38.3% |
| 8 | West Virginia | 37.8% |
| 9 | Florida | 36.8% |
| 10 | Ohio | 36.6% |
| 11 | Arkansas | 36.4% |
| 12 | Nevada | 35.8% |
| 13 | Delaware | 35.5% |
| 14 | Georgia | 35.3% |
| 15 | Arizona | 35% |
| 16 | Michigan | 34.1% |
| 17 | Indiana | 33.9% |
| 18 | Kentucky | 33.7% |
| 19 | North Carolina | 33.5% |
| 20 | Rhode Island | 33% |
| 21 | Tennessee | 32.4% |
| 22 | Texas | 31.8% |
| 23 | Pennsylvania | 31.6% |
| 24 | Illinois | 31.6% |
| 25 | Maryland | 31.5% |
| 26 | Oklahoma | 31.4% |
| 27 | California | 30.1% |
| 28 | Missouri | 29.5% |
| 29 | Nebraska | 29.4% |
| 30 | Maine | 29.1% |
| 31 | Kansas | 28.7% |
| 32 | Hawaii | 28.7% |
| 33 | New York | 28.6% |
| 34 | Virginia | 27.8% |
| 35 | Connecticut | 27.8% |
| 36 | Massachusetts | 26.8% |
| 37 | Wisconsin | 26.7% |
| 38 | Iowa | 26.6% |
| 39 | Alaska | 26.4% |
| 40 | South Dakota | 26.2% |
| 41 | Montana | 26% |
| 42 | New Jersey | 25.6% |
| 43 | Vermont | 25.6% |
| 44 | New Hampshire | 24.6% |
| 45 | Oregon | 24.4% |
| 46 | Minnesota | 23.9% |
| 47 | Wyoming | 23.4% |
| 48 | Washington | 23.4% |
| 49 | North Dakota | 23.1% |
| 50 | Colorado | 21.8% |
| 51 | Idaho | 20% |
| 52 | Utah | 14.1% |
More on share of births to unmarried women
- US Counties With the Lowest Share of Births to Unmarried Women
- Share of births to unmarried women by US county: map by year and what it goes with
A ranking describes places, not the people in them, and a high or low place does not by itself say why. All US rankings.