[rayiner]

Teenage pregnancy in the first world has little to do with either sex education or values. Having kids is the default mode of people. The instinct to reproduce is suppressed in the wealthier class, because they have a huge opportunity cost to do so. Poor people don't have much of an opportunity cost, and indeed have economic incentives to have kids (more welfare support). 60% of girls in the study didn't have kids as teenagers, yet only 4% of the whole sample went to college. It wasn't like the people gave up a lot by having kids.

[jnazario]

> Teenage pregnancy in the first world has little to do with either sex education or values.

i don't know where you get your ideas but they do not jive with many more learned observations than yours.

http://journals.lww.com/ajnonline/Fulltext/2012/03000/Compre... Comprehensive Sex Education for Teens Is More Effective than Abstinence

http://www.siecus.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Feature.showFeatu... National Data Shows Comprehensive Sex Education Better at Reducing Teen Pregnancy than Abstinence-Only Programs

http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/250073 The Effects of Sex Education on Teen Sexual Activity and Teen Pregnancy

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080319151225.ht... Comprehensive Sex Education Might Reduce Teen Pregnancies, Study Suggests

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3194801/ Abstinence-Only Education and Teen Pregnancy Rates: Why We Need Comprehensive Sex Education in the U.S Kathrin F. Stanger-Hall, David W. Hall PLoS One. 2011; 6(10): e24658. Published online 2011 October 14. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0024658

related: http://news.uga.edu/releases/article/abstinence-only-educati... Abstinence-only education does not lead to abstinent behavior, UGA researchers find

http://blogs.ajc.com/get-schooled-blog/2011/11/30/uga-study-... UGA study: Higher pregnancy and birth rates in states with abstinence-only sex ed programs in schools

[rayiner]

I'm not saying abstinence-only education works or works better or as well as comprehensive sex education. Obviously the latter works better. I'm saying that the impact of sex education and access to contraceptives is, beyond a certain threshold, less important than socioeconomic factors: See: http://www.csmonitor.com/The-Culture/Family/Modern-Parenthoo...; http://www.chicagonow.com/chicago-muckrakers/2012/07/study-t....

Quote from one of the authors of a study cited in the second article:

> "The wider that gap is [to the next socioeconomic rung of the ladder] the more likely these young girls are to think, 'You know what? It's so unlikely that I'm going to get there, even if I play by the rules and stay in school,'" said Kearney. "There's less return to making that investment in education, in delaying motherhood. If you're on this low economic trajectory, there's not much cost in having a teen birth. You didn't anticipate going to college or getting married anyway.