What Would It Take To Rebuild the Village?

Six years ago, The Atlantic published a viral essay provocatively titled “ The Nuclear Family Was a Mistake .” Critics called it an attack on the family, and I emphasized at the time that it was a horrible title for an article behind a paywall, but the core insight hit home: when we isolated the nuclear family from the broader “village” of grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and close friends, we lost something essential. At the time, my fiancé’s Italian-American family had shown me what that village could look like. His mother, the Nonna, was the matriarch. Cousins felt like siblings. When one marriage ended, the whole extended network absorbed the shock instead of one isolated household crumbling. It wasn’t perfect, but it was resilient. America’s fertility collapse isn’t just about economics or “girlboss” women choosing careers. Fast-forward to today, and the data is clear: America’s fertility collapse isn’t just about economics or “girlboss” women choosing careers. A new report from the Institute for Family Studies, the 2026 State of Fertility Report , lays it out with fresh data. As I wrote recently for Evie Magazine , supporting first-time mom friends is a small step in rebuilding a sense of community for new parents. Now the new data confirms it. The women (and men) who feel they have a team behind them are the ones who dare to have the families they actually want. U.S. fertility has fallen below 1.6 children per woman. If trends continue, our population peaks around 350 million in the 2050s and then shrinks. But the report doesn’t just diagnose the problem. It reveals what actually moves the needle on fertility desires and intentions: the village . Peer culture is one of the strongest predictors of whether people want to have more children. In the IFS survey, Americans under 30 with the least supportive friends desired only about 1.7 children on average. Those with the most helpful friends (people who would show up, cook meals, watch the baby, or offer real emotional support) desired nearly 2.8 children. That’s an entire extra child per family, larger than the effect of religiosity in the same models. Among couples who already want more kids than they have, those with supportive friends were far more likely to say they intended to have another child soon (40–50% vs. 20–30% with unsupportive friends). Supportive friends appear to be a significant factor in helping couples go from wanting an additional child to making it happen. Supportive friends appear to be a significant factor in helping couples go from wanting an additional child to making it happen. Thankfully, Americans still want more kids. The same survey shows most people aspire to about 2.4 children, the number that would keep our population stable and growing. The gap between what we say we want and what we’re having is widening to levels not seen since the 1930s, an indication of how important it is for American couples to surround themselves with kind, loving friends who want them to have more children. Our broader celebrity culture matters for fertility desires too. As we wrote in " Can Celebrities Solve Our Fertility Crisis ," fans of public figures with larger families desire more children themselves, according to the IFS data. But the real game-changer is active help, not just passive exposure. For actual behavioral intentions, nothing beats real-life friends who change diapers in a pinch and bring dinner when times get difficult. My twin sister is a perfect example. She had her first son during the pandemic, and the support network wasn’t there for her. The fear and societal rules during that period made it more difficult for the village to be more actively involved. The struggles she faced, parenting with no way to receive help from friends and family, caused her to make a decision she never expected: no more kids. Her son would be an only child. If I could legally step in today as a reliable caregiver, taking her son for a week while she recovers from surgery, travels for work, or just needs breathing room, it would make a tangible difference. But stepping in isn’t always easy. Right now, informal arrangements can feel risky because of liability concerns, social awkwardness, or lack of recognition. The IFS report directly addresses this problem. In its section on “Family-Friendly Cultural Norms,” the authors recommend real steps to “legalize the village” without turning children into state property: • Liability protections so parents aren’t punished for leaving kids with trusted friends (safe-harbor and Good Samaritan-style rules, plus “free-range parenting” norms). • Creating “civil godparents,” legally recognized roles for designated non-parental adults (friends or extended kin) with broader in loco parentis rights to care for children when needed. • Hospitals and prenatal care that actively help expecting parents build a list of friends they can call on, legitimizing the ask so new moms don’t feel embarrassed. • Public campaigns that honor “care donation” (watching a friend’s kids the way we celebrate other selfless acts), conferring real social status on those who show up. These ideas strengthen the nuclear family by expanding its concrete support network. They don’t replace mom and dad; they make it possible for mom and dad to raise their kids without burning out along the way. The IFS report shows that generous financial supports matter too. It proposes policies like “American Birthday Accounts,” (a baby bonus structured as an investment that could deliver help for stable families having children), ending marriage penalties in welfare programs, and building more family-friendly housing. We also need to reckon with today’s generation of new grandparents. Many grew up in the peak of American individualism, prizing independence above all. Plenty of my friends with young children say their own parents aren’t as involved as they’d hoped. We have to rebuild the cultural expectation that grandparents want to be close to the future generations. We need to remember that multi-generational proximity and regular involvement in caregiving are normal and good for families and young parents. Other cultures still do this well. In many parts of the world, raising children remains a shared duty across generations and close friends. It creates accountability and joy for the extended family, instead of a lonely parental abyss. The nuclear family is the irreplaceable core of our society, but it was never meant to stand alone. Strengthening the nuclear family and cultivating the village are not opposites; they’re complementary. The nuclear family is the irreplaceable core of our society, but it was never meant to stand alone. When we isolate it from broader support networks, we see that fertility falls, burnout rises, and the next generation grows up without the relationships that once made big families feel desirable. We’re not choosing between the nuclear family and the village. We’re choosing whether to give the nuclear family the village it needs to thrive again. Our demographic future, and the kind of America our children will inherit, depends on getting this right. Mothers need more support. It’s time to strengthen the family unit and expand the circle around it. We’re all in this together.