Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez decries the student loan debt, low incomes, and climate change facing ‘entire generations’ as birth rates continue to fall

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez decries the student loan debt, low incomes, and climate change facing ‘entire generations’ as birth rates continue to fall

Amid the country's ongoing birth rate decline, one lawmaker is denouncing the systemic obstacles she believes are contributing to the fall.

In a Wednesday tweet, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez responded to a CBS News article on the declining birth rates "crisis" among younger generations.

New data from health departments in more than two dozen states suggests the pandemic-driven "baby bust"experts warned of maybe starting to materialize. 

But Ocasio-Cortez said the root of the issue goes beyond the lockdowns of the last twelve months.

"The actual crisis is how entire generations are sunk w/inhumane levels of student debt, low incomes, high rent, no guarantee of healthcare & little action on climate change," she tweeted.

Those hurdles, she said, create "a situation where feeling stable enough to have a kid can feel more like a luxury than a norm."

There are movements of people declining to have children due to climate change, as Insider has reported. Student loans have also previously been reported as a block on having kids.

While state health records provided to CBS News show a 7% drop in births in the month of December “” nine months after the pandemic began “” experts say the 2020 decline is part of a larger, ongoing downturn in birth