Working Class Economist: The Hidden Cost of Denying Planned Parenthood Funding

I’ll keep this short as the one thing I know Republicans will come on here and comment about is abortion. The wealthy conservatives that actually control the Republican Party won’t really care enough to comment on millionaire tax breaks or will sidestep the drama of having to actually talk to a working class person. However, the anti-abortion people are without a doubt the most vocal voice in the Republican Party, they are tireless in their stance abortion should be illegal. I’m not here to argue that one way or the other, but I am here to argue that denying Planned Parenthood funding will cost more in the long run.

Last week the House Republicans passed a budget that would exclude 300 million in federal funds to Planned Parenthood in hopes of “reducing the deficit.” The current deficit is at over 14 trillion dollars so obviously cutting 300 million for Planned Parenthood is nothing, less nothing, non-existent, a two dollar tip you leave for the waitress at Waffle House over the course of your yearly expenses. Of course, none of this is really about trimming the deficit (just as all of their other cuts to small costs like the EPA, heating subsidies for poor people, and the national endowment of the arts aren’t) so much as it is about the false belief Planned Parenthood is an abortion organization and wanting to bankrupt all organizations that are.

Planned Parenthood does provided abortions, but there is a world of other services a woman is just as likely to get there. They provide STD screenings—and the last thing we need is a population with less access to this—along with cancer screenings, low income health checkups, and birth control prescriptions which is the main thing people get when going there. You can’t have it both ways, either you want people to have more ready access to birth control—statistically proven to make the abortion rate go down because it makes the unwanted pregnancy rate go down—or you’re okay with a higher number of abortions. You also can’t have it both ways that you want every child in America to be born regardless of the parent’s finances, relationship status, and likelihood that child will have a mental disability but also cut funding for single mothers or low income families (which is exactly what the new house budget proposes).

Eliminating Planned Parenthood would make 2021’s budget go up in MANY different, unintended ways as the number of teen mothers, unwed mothers, and children placed up for adoption sky rockets (not just from more difficult access to abortions, but also birth control) and the budget explodes providing welfare for this large number of families with more children than they can take care of. Also, a population with a much greater risk of untreated cancer and STDs would drive up the budget in various ways. Planned Parenthood provides many services more often than they do abortions, and lower income people will have few to no options for alternatives. Do you really want a lower class with no access to treatment of basic medical conditions or unaware if they’re carrying a potentially fatal STD?