Posted on 06/09/2011 1:24:56 PM PDT by wagglebee
June 9, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Last month’s Guttmacher Institute report on the incidence of abortion, which appeared in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology, contained mostly good news for the pro-life movement. The Guttmacher researchers found that between 2000 and 2008, the abortion rate declined by 8 percentage points. Even though abortion data from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) is not as current, their figures seem broadly similar to the figures reported by Guttmacher. All in all, this research provides further evidence that the incidence of abortion has continued its steady decline since peaking in the early 1990s.
Some of the more interesting findings from this study have received relatively little attention from mainstream media outlets. For instance, even though the abortion rate has declined for most demographic groups, the largest decline has taken place among African-American women. The abortion rate for minors also continued to fall dramatically, declining by 22 percent between 2000 and 2008. The abortion rate among married women is dramatically less than the abortion rate for women who either cohabit or have never been married. Finally, women with no religious affiliation have a higher abortion rate than those who identify with some religion.
The one finding that has received considerable media attention is that between 2000 and 2008, the abortion rate increased substantially among women below the poverty line. According to the study, low-income women accounted for 42 percent of all abortions in 2008, and their abortion rate increased 18 percent between 2000 and 2008. What is somewhat puzzling is that this finding is not consistent across racial and ethnic groups. The abortion rate for low-income white women increased dramatically between 2000 and 2008, but the rate for low-income black women increased only slightly and the rate for low income Hispanic women actually fell. The authors fail to adequately explain these racial disparities.
Regardless, these broad trends can be partly explained by looking at the enactment of state-level pro-life laws. Between 2000 and 2008, there was an increase in the number of states with parental-involvement laws and women’s-right-to-know laws. However, at the state level, pro-lifers have not made much progress lately on the public funding of abortion. This is because most of the dozen states that publicly fund abortion through Medicaid do so because of judicial rulings. Since plenty of studies show that the public funding of abortion increases abortion rates, this might explain why pro-life progress has stalled among low-income women.
In their analysis, the Guttmacher researchers focus on the increase in the abortion rate among low-income women. Not surprisingly, they blame a lack of access to contraception. However, this particular study does not provide any evidence that lack of access to contraception is responsible for the increase in the abortion rate for low-income women. In a public statement one of the Guttmacher researchers stated that “cuts to publicly funded family planning services disproportionately affect poor women.” But again, the study fails to cite any specific spending cuts. If anything, it appears that federal spending for contraception increased during this time period, as federal grants to Planned Parenthood increased from $165 million in 1998 to $363 million in 2008.
This raises an interesting question. Could the increase in federal funds to Planned Parenthood be responsible for this increase in the abortion rate among low-income women? It is possible that women who are more confident in the reliability of their contraceptives may engage in sexual activity more often. More importantly, money is fungible, and the federal funds that Planned Parenthood receives for contraception programs could certainly free up other money that could then subsidize abortions for low-income earners. The increase in the incidence of abortion among low-income women is an interesting puzzle for public-health scholars and social scientists to solve. However, the increase in federal grant money to Planned Parenthood since 2000 renders it unlikely that lack of access to contraception is the culprit behind the increase.
Another interesting facet of the study is the fact that the timeframe analyzed nearly coincides with the presidency of George W. Bush. Now, obviously there is not much that any sitting president can do about abortion rates in the short term. But that has certainly not stopped liberal commentators from lavishly praising President Clinton for the 1990s abortion decline or sharply criticizing President Reagan for the slight uptick in the abortion rate that occurred in the 1980s. In the interest of honesty and fairness, will these same commentators give President Bush some credit for this abortion decline? Consider me skeptical.
— Michael J. New is an assistant professor of political science at the University of Alabama and a fellow at the Witherspoon Institute in Princeton, N.J.
The crux of the problems is that two many are willing to believe that Big Murder's contraception business is somehow a completely separate entity from the slaughterhouses.
Big Murder gets millions from the government and they figure out a way to use it to kill babies because that is what they PREFER TO DO with their money.
Do abortion providers demand proof of income before they will perform the abortion? Do they also demand proof of religion?
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“Why is the abortion rate up amongst the poor, but down everywhere else?”
The poor cannot afford to have babies. They CAN afford to have government subsidized abortions however.
It’s wierd they never think of the costs of raising a child when they decide to engage in unprotected sexual relations.
“The poor”, inherently tend to be uneducated, and this correlates with not understanding that they are killing a person in an abortion.
This is also why Big Murder needs taxpayer subsidies for abortions, because those most likely to get them are most likely not to be able to pay for them.
Abortion is a cheap form of birth control for the poor. And you don’t have to take that bothersome pill every day. Who can remember to do that?
Maybe because there are a lot more “poor” now than a couple of years ago.
I will take it one step further, and say that it is a moral issue, created by a large swath of America's poor accepting the amoral authority of the government over God's authority. I guarantee that compared within demographics that abortion rates are higher at all income levels for people who believe the government is the font of all that is good, verses even nominal Christians, or other people of deep faith who believe in a higher moral authority than man.
It just so happens that people who believe in god government make up a substantially larger portion of the "poor" demographic than they do the others; thanks to decades of government policies that destroy the family and social structure of communities.
Margaret Sanger would be proud. Her eugenic vision of the poor, minorities and other “undesirables” having abortions so that only the right kind of people would continue to breed is playing out.
Man-hating, divorce/cohabitation policies, manufacturing moved overseas (see first item), big government, social programs (see first three items), drugs, local regulations against new, small manufacturing starts, even in remote areas,...
Oops. Sorry. Never mind. (And I hate it when others do just this — make stupid remarks without reading the article.)
My guess is that most middle- and upper- class men know how to prevent getting trapped by women who have come to realize that equality sucks, and are looking for some way out of the rat-race...
It’s not like the middle- and upper- class birthrate is going up at the same time as abortions are dropping.
medicaid
Because many “poor” people live in places where rampant sex is part of the society. There are less societal controls on rutting like animals in the various inner city neighborhoods.
People with more money think ahead because they have “more to lose.” They tend to plan ahead for sex and worry about getting pregnant, long before the hot date on Saturday night. Thus they are more prepared.
Also, many girls in poor areas do not have a man who cares about them, and takes responsibility for the baby. There are always abortion clinics near (the same clinics who were also near for providing birth control before the sex, if the girl had stopped to prepare). There is no one there to support adoption. Older women would be more likely to say “Aint nobody gonna get to raise MY baby.”
Sadly young black girls who get pregnant do not understand that abortion clinics on demand were started to get rid of unwanted BLACK babies. It’s a shame. Finally the adoption community realizes that black babies can be very happy in white or non-black families. There are homes for each unwanted baby. Not sure anyone in certain communities understands that.
Eugenics...
.also the 24/7 agitprop in poor communities which promote rap morality.....(no morality)....so therefore, they more easily use their bodies like it is a commodity.....sex is something with little or no value.......makes them feel powerful for 10 minutes or “loved” while it takes 2 minutes for someone to use them.
This, of course, is just a 10 minute illusion that they are “valued” because they are just used for someone else’s gratification and lust with no regard to the humanity and future of the girl (no commitments, ever) which always transfers to the baby.
No commitments....no capability of commitment to raising a child for 20 years.
Morality of Marx.....to destroy the natural family and destroy all relationship so everyone is equally as loved as everyone else in the commune. Problem....no one wants to go through the self-sacrifice of raising a baby. What’s the point.
Poor people....have....POOR habits.
Potential causes of this studies’ findings:
1. Abortion rates are several times higher for black women than any other group. If the rate trended up just a little, it may be from decrease in demand from other groups leading to a lower cost of services, leading to their demand plateauing.
2. Abortion rates likely rose among poor whites due to lower marriage rates among a group that still ties ideal family structure to two married parents. More out of wed-lock pregnancies resulted in more abortions among a demographic group, since there is a unwed birth rise of past ten years among whites.
3. Hispanics from Mexico are more religious than Hispanics who’ve Americanized. The fastest growing part of the Hispanic population, the immigrants, are the most religious portion. If pro-life is linked to faith, an influx of more religious corresponds to fewer abortions on average.
4. A rise in abortion rates among poor women in general is easily accounted for by fewer affluent having abortions, making it cheaper to end unwanted pregnancies. The welfare benefit of a child has been relatively stable, but the cost to kill it has gone down.
5. Those most likely to have illegitimate children are the poor. The surest guarantee of poverty is unmarried, no high school, kid before 20. A rise in that population is due to unmarried children of baby boomers now having illegitimate kids (echo boom). Overall population stable but the more vulnerable single mother cohort is growing (see percentage of all births out of wedlock rising even overall as births fall). And a rise in this “poor” group’s numbers will raise their overall abortion rate. This is doubly true if there is an advantage of reporting poverty to end unwanted pregnancies.
Bush’s fault.
Or Palin.
Or both.
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