For much of the past century, scholars have questioned the viability and sustainability of liberal arts colleges, and empirical research suggests that the number of liberal arts colleges has declined in recent decades. In one study, of 212 colleges identified as liberal arts colleges in 1990, only 130 continued to serve primarily a nonprofessional mission by 2008-9. Scholars suggest several explanations for this trend: the high costs associated with providing a traditional liberal arts education, technological innovation that decreases costs of alternative forms of teaching and learning, and the shift toward a knowledge-based economy. In recent years, demographic shifts --both away from the Northeast in general and toward greater shares of Hispanic young people--have persistently nudged the market toward subgroups with historically lower attachment to higher education. Nathan Grawe argues here that the financial crisis that wreaked such havoc on institutional budgets over the past ten years isn't done as far as colleges are concerned. He writes that in response to the financial uncertainty of the crisis, young people chose to have fewer children. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that from 2007 to 2010, the total fertility rate (a measure of the total number of children a woman will have over her life cycle) fell by 9 percent. As the economy recovered, however, the total fertility rate did not. In fact, it continued to slide down so that by 2017, fertility was about 17 percent lower than the pre-crisis peak. As a result, today the total fertility rate sits well below the rate required to replace the population--particularly in the Northeast quadrant of the country. As these young people grow older, a sharp decrease in the number of eighteen-year-olds beginning in the year 2026 can be anticipated. A more fundamental threat to liberal arts colleges may flow from their liberal arts missions. Some researchers argue that higher education in general, and liberal arts colleges in particular, must reconceive the connection between education and workplace preparation. If industry doesn't force this conversation, prospective students might. Grawe writes that still in all he sees reasons to hope for a vibrant future for the liberal arts. While some scholars argue that liberal arts schools have declined in number as institutions re-envision the meaning of their missions, there are those who interpret the data as evidence of the incredible resilience of small colleges as they have adapted to changing environments. Grawe closes by noting that whether academia articulates the value of traditional liberal arts degrees, adds programs that press the boundaries of that tradition, implements radical cost savings, or has some other response, one thing is clear: the demographic challenges on the horizon are significant and call for considered actions. Doing nothing seems like a very risky strategy.