The two primary drivers of household formation over time are demographic and economic factors, according to Nothaft. For example, household growth averaged about 2 percent annually from the mid-1960s until the early 1980s when baby boomers were at the prime household formation age, but household formation rates halved from 1990 until the mid-2000s when the population of those born in the 1970s, a much smaller birth cohort, reached their 20s.
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