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  • 2020-09-22 (xsd:date)
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  • Which Party Is More Effective at Reducing Abortions? (en)
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  • In September 2020, social media users began circulating a text meme charting the decrease in abortion rates in the U.S. during previous presidential administrations, attributing the greater drop in those rates during Democratic administrations to a difference in approach (i.e., making it illegal vs. making it unnecessary): As we noted in an earlier article on a similar topic, following the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision that protected a pregnant woman's liberty to choose to have an abortion without excessive government restriction, the abortion rate rose immediately afterward until it peaked in the 1980s, and it has fairly consistently declined since that peak through presidential administrations of both parties: Although it is true that the abortion rate has experienced greater declines during Democratic administrations than Republican ones, we can't draw any definitive conclusion that, as the meme tries to suggest, this difference is primarily due to varying approaches by the two main political parties. The simple idea presented by the meme has a number of flaws, chief among them that political factors that might influence the abortion rate (e.g., policies, legislation, judicial appointments and rulings) do not neatly conform to presidential terms of office -- what takes place during one administration generally continues to have an effect throughout subsequent administrations. As well, events occurring at state and local levels (not necessarily directly tied to federal actions) can have a substantial impact on the availability and prevalence of abortions. More important, though, is that we cannot definitively determine to what extent political factors influence the abortion rate. As the Guttmacher Institute (a pro-abortion-rights research organization) observed, recent declines in the abortion rate appear to have been driven not primarily by abortion restrictions but by a broader decline in pregnancies: What's driving that decline in pregnancies, then? We don't know that for sure, either, but likely a combination of social, cultural, economic, medical, and political factors: The Guttmacher Institute posited a similar mix of factors to explain the decline in the abortion rate: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) also offered a combination of potential explanations for lower abortion rates: As we stated four years ago, causation between the presidency and abortion rates [is] difficult to demonstrate in any case, because it is hard to draw a straight line between federal government policy (let alone presidential policy) and abortion procurement. That observation remains true today. (en)
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