{"id":182803,"date":"2018-07-07T11:15:36","date_gmt":"2018-07-07T16:15:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=182803"},"modified":"2018-06-27T11:48:36","modified_gmt":"2018-06-27T16:48:36","slug":"does-poverty-lead-abortion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/does-poverty-lead-abortion\/","title":{"rendered":"Does poverty lead to abortion, or does abortion lead to poverty?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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(Abort 73<\/a>) Among its apologists, abortion has long been heralded for its purported social benefits\u2014just as birth control was before it. By preventing “unwanted” children from being birthed, abortion is supposed to reduce strain on the system and create better outcomes for those already born. To that end, California<\/a> taxpayers foot the bill for more than half the state\u2019s abortions. In 2014, that amounted to almost 90,000 abortions<\/a>\u2014all in the name of fiscal responsibility. If this rather macabre investment strategy really does produce better outcomes for the state, you wouldn\u2019t know it. On the fiscal scale<\/a>, California ranks 8th from the bottom, which is the exact inverse of where it ranks with regard to abortion. Only seven\u00a0states and districts<\/a>\u00a0abort a higher percentage of their children than California.<\/p>\n

I realize of course that an almost infinite number of variables influences a state’s financial health. It would be naive to suggest that fiscal standing is directly attributable to abortion rates, but what if there is<\/em> a symbiotic relationship between abortion and poverty? Last month the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) released their abortion surveillance report for 2014<\/a>. Overall, “the total number and rate of reported abortions decreased 2%, and the ratio decreased 7%.” It’s that last number\u2014abortion ratio<\/em>\u2014which is the most important because it measures total abortions against live births, allowing us to calculate the percentage of pregnancies that end in abortion each year. Among CDC reporting districts, 16.7% of pregnancies ended in abortion in 2013 (excluding miscarriages) and 15.7% ended in abortion in 2014. While that continues to move the needle in the right direction, it’s important to remember that when it comes to abortion, the United States is not a monolith.<\/p>\n

The abortion ratio actually increased in 16 states\/districts in 2014, stayed the same in North Dakota<\/a>, and we don\u2019t know what happened in California<\/a>, Maryland<\/a>, or New Hampshire<\/a>\u2014since they continually ignore the CDC\u2019s annual request for abortion data. Just as financial health varies widely from state to state, so too does the abortion ratio. Whereas 33% of all pregnancies are aborted in the state of New York<\/a> (according to the Guttmacher Institute<\/a>), \u201conly\u201d 12% are aborted in Texas<\/a>. And though 19% of Vermont<\/a> pregnancies end in abortion, that number drops to less than 2% in Wyoming<\/a>\u2014a state of close to the same population. The CDC says it this way: \u201cthroughout the years, the incidence of abortion has varied considerably across subpopulations and remains higher in some demographic groups than others.”<\/p>\n

READ: Abortion up to birth is legal in the United States. Here’s what that looks like.<\/em><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Among the five states that are the most financially healthy<\/a> (Florida<\/a>, North Dakota<\/a>, South Dakota<\/a>, Utah<\/a> & Wyoming<\/a>), four have abortion ratios that are dramatically below the national average. On the other end of the spectrum, four of the five states that are the worst-off financially have abortion ratio that are well above<\/em> the national average (Maryland<\/a>, Massachusetts<\/a>, Illinois<\/a> & New Jersey<\/a>). Of the 18 states that are financially “above average,” only two\u2014Florida<\/a> and Nevada<\/a>\u2014have higher-than-average abortion ratios, and of the 18 states that are financially “below average,” fully half have higher-than-average abortion ratios\u2014which is even more significant when you consider that only 15 states<\/a> in the country have higher-than-average abortion ratios (since those 15 states include four of the five most populous).\u00a0At the very least, there is no evidence to suggest that high\u00a0abortion ratios yield better fiscal results than low abortion ratios\u2014it’s quite the opposite.<\/p>\n

Most pundits would say that\u00a0poor financial health\u00a0leads to higher abortion ratios, but what if it also works the other way round? What if abortion isn’t just a result of fiscal problems but also a cause of fiscal problems? Though the CDC doesn\u2019t track for wealth or education, their numbers reveal that in addition to state of residence, abortion ratios vary widely across two demographic lines: race and relationship-status<\/em>. Among white women, 10% of pregnancies end in abortion. Among black women, it’s more than 29%. Not surprisingly, these numbers closely mirror the percentage\u00a0of whites and blacks who live below the poverty line\u20149% for whites and 22% for blacks<\/a>. Among married women, 4% of pregnancies end in abortion, but among unmarried<\/em> women, that number jumps to 27%. Here again, the\u00a0numbers are largely reflective of the corresponding poverty rates\u20145% for married women and 17% for unmarried<\/a>. When two or more of the demographic traits associated with higher abortion ratios overlap, the numbers become even more startling. For instance, if a single black woman gets pregnant in New York, there’s at least a 49% chance1<\/sup> her baby’s life will end in abortion\u2014and it’s even higher if she lives in New York City. Poverty and abortion both are urban-centric.<\/p>\n

The Centers for Disease Control comes to an unremarkable but revealing conclusion with regard to their 2014 abortion numbers. The report reads:<\/p>\n

Despite the multiple influences on abortion, because unintended pregnancy precedes nearly all cases of abortions, efforts to reduce the incidence of abortion need to focus on helping women, men, and couples avoid pregnancies that they do not desire.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I suspect this is roughly the same conclusion they\u2019ve come to each year for the last four decades. What makes it revealing is its inference about abortion. Doesn\u2019t abortion itself \u201chelp\u201d women, men, and couples avoid pregnancies that they do not desire? That\u2019s what the pundits say. Why then does the CDC regard abortion as a failure of the system? Why do we need to \u201creduce the incidence of abortion\u201d at all\u2014if there is nothing wrong with abortion? At the risk of stating the obvious, there is<\/em> something wrong with abortion. Specifically, it kills the most innocent and helpless members of the human community<\/a>\u2014and no amount of medical jargon can change that fact.<\/p>\n