America--What if we had an extra 100 million citizens?

December 16, 2012

What if America today had 400 million-plus citizens instead of 300?

Research from the Guttmacher Institute and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show American women had well over 50 million abortions in the past 40 years. If those aborted had been born and reproduced at normal birth rates, today we would have an additional 100 million citizens. Imagine our nation, facing today's economic challenges, with this many additional citizens requiring food, shelter, education and health care.

Perhaps the additional population might have provided some benefits for our nation. Some to consider: (1) Our government might have attempted to actually stop illegal immigration over the past three decades if we already had a supply of low-cost workers in this hypothetical population boom. (2) We would have had an almost endless additional supply of volunteers for our military, allowing our politicians to "build" even more nations. (3) This over-supply of labor would have drastically lowered U.S. wages, resulting in fewer jobs being shipped offshore. (4) We wouldn't have the coming shortage of FICA-paying workers to fund retiring boomers' entitlements.

Truthfully, despite the remote possibility of benefits, I could foresee mostly tragic results. Our nation already hovers on the brink of failure. Current economic conditions wouldn't be just slowly crushing our middle class; it would have already been annihilated!

To me, though, 50 million-plus abortions seem unimaginable. I can't help wondering why, during this time span, with so many other effective and relatively inexpensive birth control options readily available, so many choose abortion. The pill, for example, is 99 percent effective if taken as directed, and the cost for the two most commonly prescribed versions is between $8 and $12 per month through almost any chain pharmacy. Many county health departments (including ours) supply both the pill and condoms at no charge.

The average cost of a non-hospital, first-trimester abortion is around $500, but this does not include the costs for treating possible side-effects, the main one being infection. Nor does it include the costs for treating the inevitable increases in sexually transmitted diseases resulting from unprotected sex. Remember, we all pay higher taxes and health insurance premiums to fund these expenses.

I support the right to an abortion in cases of rape or incest. I can even understand when a woman who has tried diligently to practice birth control might choose abortion over an unwanted pregnancy. However, rape, incest, failed diligent birth control efforts, and other birth control options being too expensive cannot possibly precipitate most of these 58 million abortions. In fact, researchers only attribute about 2 percent of all abortions to the first two reasons.

The underlying demographics of those receiving abortions seem to expose the truth. These data show women under 24 receive more than half of all abortions, single women account for 75 percent, and 50 percent have had previous abortions.

Few issues have been more passionately debated than abortion since Roe v. Wade became the law of the land in 1973. The extremely passionate opposing sides of pro-choice and pro-life remain diametrically locked in battle against one another, and I doubt it will ever change.

Personally, I don't think the abortion debate should continue to be based only on morality or women's rights. Instead, society should acknowledge that the most important issue to be dealt with is the significant population of uneducated or careless couples who too often allow abortion to serve as their primary birth control method —and developing viable strategies to change this behavior.  

I do not think the government should interfere with women's rights to determine how they use their bodies. However, I do wish more of this subset of our population would make the choice to use less expensive pregnancy prevention options. While we cannot afford a population explosion, we can and should find ways to prevent abortion from being the primary birth control method for so many.

Awareness of options, education and inexpensive birth control must become much more readily available. Most developed nations sell the pill over the counter. Why not here? Surely if we could find effective ways to increase the use of other options, most on either side of this debate and society overall would be the winners.

We see a constant barrage of ads for erectile dysfunction drugs. Why not a series of ads promoting best practices for prevention of pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases? If I were the parent of younger children, I would surely prefer to have a discussion with my kids about the latter than I would about EDS drugs.

Mike Tower

Please visit the blog of a good pal of mine:  Lee's Political Opinions, and the website for an organization he and I co-founded:  Citizens Against Politics As Usual