Guest Opinion: Throwing Out the Economy with the Baby

The connection between robust birth rates and economic growth has long been ignored.

FRONT ROYAL, Va. (PRI) - Abortion is not only an unspeakable crime; it is also, it should be noted, an economic disaster. As a result of the deliberate elimination of 50 million productive Americans from our midst, the U.S. economy has taken a hit measured in the trillions of dollars. Although it would be simplistic to blame the current financial crisis on the ongoing abortion holocaust, it is equally simplistic to pretend, as many do, that the two have absolutely no connection.

Demographic researcher Dennis Howard has been following the economic consequences of abortion since 1995. In his 1997 book, The Abortion Bomb: America's Demographic Disaster, he wrote that he saw "little hope that we can avoid an eventual crash on Wall Street that will make the 1930's look like cashing in your cards after a bad game of Monopoly."

Well, the S&P 500 has not quite reached the levels characteristic of the Great Depression, but the most recent stock charts are beginning to bear a worrisome resemblance to those of Black Friday.

Howard, whose background is in market research and investigative reporting, summed up his views in a recently published piece entitled, "The $35 Trillion Elephant in the Living Room." "No matter how you slice it," he writes, "aggressive 'population control' exacts a huge price in future economic growth that can never be recovered. Indeed, it is a loss that reverberates through all future generations. Without an enormous new Baby Boom lasting another 40 or 50 years, that growth is lost forever."

According to Howard, a conservative estimate of the GDP lost through abortion totals an incredible $35 trillion. If you add into the equation the number of babies lost to abortifacient contraception like the pill, IUDs, and RU-486, the number doubles. Howard bases his numbers on the direct economic contribution of individuals to the economy.

He turns the tables on the overpopulation fear mongers, arguing that, far from facing a "population bomb," we are facing an "abortion bomb." And unlike Ehrlich's bogus prophecies of doom, Howard's warnings seem to be coming true as we read the daily headlines of falling stock markets, collapsing home prices, and one federal bailout after another. "We don't have a debt crisis," he points out. "We have a death crisis."

Howard is on to something. There is little doubt that the birth dearth, by robbing us of tens of millions of producers and consumers, is contributing to our current economic maladies. To the various factors that have pushed us into the current economic crisis, from unscrupulous lending practices to homebuyers, to the lack of regulatory oversight of Wall Street, we must add the destructive act of abortion.

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Howard has also considered the impact of abortion rates on America's regional economies. During the economic downturn of 1989-1994, for instance, he found that the economy recovered the fastest in those states with low abortion rates. He asserts that "the low [abortion] rate states suffered virtually no recession at all, while those with the highest rates - mainly Democratic 'blue states' - were still in recession five years later."

How does Howard suggest reviving the economy at present?

"Educate people, especially pro-lifers, on the importance of babies," he says. Too often, pro-lifers fail to recognize "the complexity of this issue, and how serious and fundamental it is to our whole society." While he does not neglect the power of pro-life laws and regulations, mentioning the Hyde amendment specifically, a far more important factor, in his view, is what people are taught. "We have to educate the public," he says. "The problem is ignorance. Most people are totally uneducated about what [abortion] is costing them, and costing the country."

This point is underscored in his article. "We need to restore real power to the people by making government more responsive to the needs of workers and families," he writes. "We need to recognize that families are the fundamental social and economic unit of society for the simple, but profound, reason that they are the source of all supply and demand."

It takes considerable courage to make such arguments, as we at PRI well know. The abortion-on-demand culture continues to run roughshod over all efforts to engage in reasoned debate. Howard complains of the pervasive hostility of the intelligentsia, which creates a situation where any pro-lifer who argues for a "connection between abortion and the world's economic woes is made to feel like a skunk at a garden party."

We at PRI have experienced first hand the looks of horror that greet many efforts to point out the evils of abortion. No matter how many facts, statistics and figures we marshal to our cause, our arguments are often simply dismissed out of hand by pro-choice extremists.

The connection between robust birth rates and economic growth has long been ignored. Perhaps now, with the economy collapsing like a house of cards around us as abortions continue unabated, these arguments can receive the hearing that they deserve.

Steven W. Mosher is the President of the Population Research Institute and the author of Population Control: Real Costs and Illusory Benefits (Transaction, 2008)

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PRI is a 501(c)(3) educational organization. We work to reverse the trends brought about by the myth of overpopulation. Our growing, global network of pro-life groups spans over 30 countries. To date, we have successfully eliminated $790 million in U.S. tax dollars to International Planned Parenthood, UNFPA, and other anti-life aboritionists while redirecting much of this to family friendly programs like Child Survival.

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