The Business of Being Born is a 2008 documentary film that explores the contemporary experience of childbirth in the United States.

Directed by Abby Epstein and produced by Ricki Lake, it compares various childbirth methods, including midwives, natural births, epidurals, and Cesarean sections.

[1] The film criticizes the American health care system with its emphasis on medicines and costly interventions and its view of childbirth as a medical emergency rather than a natural occurrence.

[2] Lake drew inspiration for the documentary from the disappointing experience she had had with the birth of her first son, Milo Sebastian Sussman.

Many experts are interviewed and they cite a multitude of reasons for these, such as the overuse of medical procedures in the interest of saving time.