Bridging the Moral Gap in the Abortion Debate
Alongside the economy, inflation, and public safety, abortion rights have become one of the year’s hot topics. Its direness is only amplified by the looming midterm election, in which control of Congress is on the line. On October 12th CNN reported that 50% of US voters identify Dobbs v. Jackson – the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the constitutional right to abortion – as a motivation to vote in the upcoming election (McPhillips 2022). Tensions are so high on the issue that in some cases they even tear families and friends apart (McCarthy 2022).
The gulf between pro-life and pro-choice Americans is somewhat unique: on both sides of the aisle, abortion is viewed as a primarily moral issue while other political issues are laden with material considerations, such as crime and death rates. (Pew Research 2013) Due to its moral connotations, the gap between pro-lifers and pro-choicers can at times feel unbridgeable. It can be difficult to convince a person that their moral opinions, which are subjective in nature, are wrong.
This moral distinction of abortion may be unnecessary; there is plenty of research to suggest that abortion has significant material implications for society. Examining the implications of legalized abortion outside of moral considerations might help circumnavigate the irreconcilable philosophical differences between pro-choicers and pro-lifers. Perhaps finding common ground in the pursuit of social wellbeing may reduce the number of families and close friends whose relationships are permanently ruined by this issue.
This article is going to discuss the implications of three academic works that suggest tangible material gains for society in the case of legalized abortion. Overall, the sum of these academic works seem to suggest that legal and accessible abortions reduce poverty, decrease crime rates, and increase economic growth.
Legalized Abortion Reduces Poverty and Increases Overall Quality of Life.
(Knowles-Myers and Welch 2021)
Caitlin Knowles-Myers and Morgan Welch argued in their Brookings article that abortion access for mothers contributed heavily to decreases in poverty and increases in life outcomes for their children.
In a review of several studies, Knowles-Myers and Welch concluded that areas with high abortion access saw reduced child abuse and child poverty, and increased likelihood of attending college for children born after the Roe v. Wade decision. The mechanism behind this effect is that abortion access gives women greater control over the circumstances under which they become mothers – effectively reducing the cases of unplanned pregnancies in circumstances and households that are not materially prepared to raise a child. (All of the studies referenced by Myers and Welch were dependent on methodologically sound research based on variation in access to abortion).
Legal Abortion Reduces Crime Rates
(Donahue and Levitt, 2020)
In a study published to the American Law and Economics Review, scholars John Donahue and Steven Levitt found that abortion access in the era of Roe v. Wade can be attributed to significant drops in both violent and property crime in the U.S.
In order to investigate a causal relationship, the authors created a ‘quasi-randomized’ trial in which they controlled for many other compounding factors and and compared states based on how early they legalized abortion, their rates of abortion in the years following, and their crime rates. This is a method employed by many academic studies of abortion.
Donahue and Levitt found that – with all else equal – states that legalized abortion earlier and maintained high effective rates of abortion saw crime fall earlier and to a greater degree; overall in these states crime fell by 27.5% more than the rest of the country between 1982 and 1997. Furthermore, they found that more recently between 1997 and 2014, violent crime dropped by another 20.1%. In the same paper, the authors demonstrated that this drop in crime rates was not nearly as well correlated with other compounding factors like the size of police forces, further showing that the drop could be strongly attributed to abortion.
This effect of abortion on crime is fundamentally connected to what Knowles-Myers and Welsh found about abortion and poverty. In essence, states which provide abortion access see fewer children born into situations of poverty that promote violent crime later on in their life; this also explains the roughly 18 year stall between the Roe v. Wade decision and the drop in violent crime during the ‘90s which the authors are principally interested in.
Legalized Abortion Contributes to Economic Growth.
(Bloom et. al. 2009).
In an article published by the Journal of Economic Growth, David Bloom and several others established a link between legalized abortion and growing Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Bloom et. al. found a link between legalized abortion and an increase in female participation in the labor force. With greater control over their family building, women were able to participate in paid labor more frequently than gender-normative duties of childcare, which are unpaid and do not contribute to GDP growth.
This has the potential to be the most impactful of the three articles discussed, as it links abortion materially with the economy, which is already competing with abortion for the top issue in the 2022 midterms. It is difficult to argue, in any case, that growth of the economy is a bad thing. The link between abortion and economic prosperity could be a powerful tool in the debate for abortion rights.
All of these pieces suggest that the U.S. stands to prosper in several meaningful measures by keeping abortions legal and accessible. Regardless of one’s moral thoughts regarding abortion on the individual level, one would be hard pressed to disregard the benefits of less poverty, less crime, and greater economic growth.
With that being said, none of the above arguments are to discredit the moral duties of our country; adequate healthcare, privacy, and dignity for women remain imperative to our country’s democratic values. However, arguing this case in the absence of material evidence may prove frustratingly unfruitful in the face of such divergent moral opinion.
In the interest of harmony, Americans should consider what implications their position on abortion may have on the material prosperity of the country, both now and in the future.
References
Bloom, David E., David Canning, Gunther Fink, and Jocelyn E. Finlay. “Fertility, Female Labor
Force Participation, and The Demographic Dividend.” Journal of Economic Growth 14, 79-101. (May 2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10887-009-9039-9.
Donahue, John J., and Steven Levitt. “The Impact of Legalized Abortion on Crime over the Last
Two Decades.” American Law and Economics Review 22, no. 2 (November 2020). https://doi.org/10.1093/aler/ahaa008.
Knowles Myers, Caitlin, and Morgan Welch. “What Can Economic Research Tell Us About the
Effect of Abortion Access on Women’s Lives?” Brookings, November 30, 2021. https://www.brookings.edu/research/what-can-economic-research-tell-us-about-the-effect-of-abortion-access-on-womens-lives/.
McCarthy, Eric. “Abortion views are dividing families and friend groups in the wake of Roe v.
Wade being overturned.” The York Dispatch, (July 11, 2022). https://www.yorkdispatch.com/story/news/2022/07/11/abortion-views-dividing-families-and-friend-groups-wake-roe-v-wade-being-overturned/10034018002/.
McPhillips, Deidre. “Abortion is a Key Motivator for US Voters in Midterm Elections, New
Survey Finds.” CNN Health, (October 12, 2022). https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/12/health/abortion-rights-motivate-voters-kff.
Pew Research Center. “Abortion Viewed in Moral Terms: Fewer See Stem Cell Research and
IVF as Moral Issues.” Pew Research, (August 15, 2013). https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2013/08/15/abortion-viewed-in-moral-terms/.