[littlexsparkee]

Do you have a source against the smartphone claim? There was a recent NBER paper in favor of this hypothesis

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48444543

The GFC housing bust happened at the same time but note that the drop in fertility was most severe for teens so the phone effect predates the shortfall in units built

[anal_reactor]

The smartphone claim is based on "people have started to prefer living alone long before smartphones became a thing", but TBH that's the weakest claim in my comment.

[soco]

> the drop in fertility was most severe for teens

You mean, there are less teen parents nowadays? That would count as improvement in my books...

[littlexsparkee]

Yes. It is in mine too, I just mentioned the effect on teens since they would be oblivious to housing prices as a motivator for the fertility drop, which was OP's thesis.