Fwd: neo-natal war on crime?

["Charles Brown" <CharlesB@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Study links abortion, low crime rate

                                               Updated 11:30 AM ET August
8, 1999

  CHICAGO, Aug. 8 (UPI) Two scholars are making the controversial
suggestion that
  legalizing abortion in the 1970s has contributed to the falling crime
rates of the 1990s,
  reports the Chicago Tribune.

  Their research not yet published in any scholarly journal _ contends that
the unwanted
  offspring of teenage, poor and minority women were aborted in
disproportionately high
  numbers in the years just after abortion was legalized, reducing the
number of "kids who are
  going to lead really tough lives," according to University of Chicago
economist Steve Levitt.

  In their paper, Levitt and Stanford University law professor John Donohue
III argue that
  legalized abortion may explain as much as half the overall drop in crime
from 1991 to 1997.

  Abortion, says Levitt, "provides a way for the would-be mothers of those
kids who are
  going to lead really tough lives to avoid bringing them into the world.
They're the ones who
  are most likely to have been unloved by their mothers, to have faced
intense poverty, to have
  had tough lives."

  As evidence for their thesis, the authors cite an earlier fall in crime
rates in five states that
  legalized abortion three years before the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe
vs. Wade
  decision. They say places with high abortion rates in the 1970s
experienced greater drops in
  crime rates in the 1990s, independent of other factors. According to the
authors, each 10
  percent increase in abortion led to a 1 percent drop in crime in
subsequent years.

  Their 45-page paper cites studies in eastern Europe and Scandinavia that
say children born to
  mothers who wanted, but could not get, an abortion were significantly
more likely to be
  involved in crime.

  The authors say their findings do not constitute an endorsement of
abortion, and they
  concede their research could be interpreted as encouraging abortion among
specific groups,
  an idea they say they do not advocate.

  The paper has been circulated among academics and law-enforcement
officials. Most have
  been cautiously positive, pointing out that the authors are respected
scholars.

  One law professor called the paper "striking, original, rigorous and
persuasive, although not
  conclusive." Another said it would have been more convincing if the
authors had also linked
  abortion to other social phenomena, such as education and employment rates.

  A New York-based research organization, the Alan Guttmacher Institute,
says one in four
  U.S. pregnancies ends in abortion today as compared to 1980, when the
figure was one in
  three. Researchers at the institute say greater contraceptive use is
largely responsible for the
  decline.

  They say women who are under age 25, separated, never married, poor or
members of a
  minority group are roughly twice as likely to have an abortion as other
women of
  childbearing age. About half of all pregnancies are unintended, and half
of those end in
  abortion, the institute says.

  Cory Richards, vice president of public policy at Guttmacher, said of the
paper: "This is not
  an argument for abortion per se. This is an argument for women not being
forced to have
  children they don't want to have. This is making the point that it's not
only bad for the
  women, but for children and society."

  David O'Steen, executive director of the National Right to life Committee
in Washington,
  D.C., described the thesis as bizarre. "I can't believe that any
significant percent of the
  population would argue that we should kill unborn babies to affect
whatever they say is
  being affected," he said.

  A spokesman for the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action
League declined to
  comment until members of the organization had had the opportunity to
study the paper.

  "No one will like it," said Levitt, but "I don't think it's our job as
economists or scientists to
  withhold truth because some people are not going to like it. I just think
it's important to
  understand the impact of social policies."

--- Begin Message ---

• To: lbo-talk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
• Subject: neo-natal war on crime?
• From: CounterPunch <sitka@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
• Date: Mon, 9 Aug 1999 12:01:40 -0400 (EDT)

[more scary malthusian research from the chicago boys.]


Study links abortion, low crime rate

                                               Updated 11:30 AM ET August
8, 1999

  CHICAGO, Aug. 8 (UPI) Two scholars are making the controversial
suggestion that
  legalizing abortion in the 1970s has contributed to the falling crime
rates of the 1990s,
  reports the Chicago Tribune.

  Their research not yet published in any scholarly journal _ contends that
the unwanted
  offspring of teenage, poor and minority women were aborted in
disproportionately high
  numbers in the years just after abortion was legalized, reducing the
number of "kids who are
  going to lead really tough lives," according to University of Chicago
economist Steve Levitt.

  In their paper, Levitt and Stanford University law professor John Donohue
III argue that
  legalized abortion may explain as much as half the overall drop in crime
from 1991 to 1997.

  Abortion, says Levitt, "provides a way for the would-be mothers of those
kids who are
  going to lead really tough lives to avoid bringing them into the world.
They're the ones who
  are most likely to have been unloved by their mothers, to have faced
intense poverty, to have
  had tough lives."

  As evidence for their thesis, the authors cite an earlier fall in crime
rates in five states that
  legalized abortion three years before the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe
vs. Wade
  decision. They say places with high abortion rates in the 1970s
experienced greater drops in
  crime rates in the 1990s, independent of other factors. According to the
authors, each 10
  percent increase in abortion led to a 1 percent drop in crime in
subsequent years.

  Their 45-page paper cites studies in eastern Europe and Scandinavia that
say children born to
  mothers who wanted, but could not get, an abortion were significantly
more likely to be
  involved in crime.

  The authors say their findings do not constitute an endorsement of
abortion, and they
  concede their research could be interpreted as encouraging abortion among
specific groups,
  an idea they say they do not advocate.

  The paper has been circulated among academics and law-enforcement
officials. Most have
  been cautiously positive, pointing out that the authors are respected
scholars.

  One law professor called the paper "striking, original, rigorous and
persuasive, although not
  conclusive." Another said it would have been more convincing if the
authors had also linked
  abortion to other social phenomena, such as education and employment rates.

  A New York-based research organization, the Alan Guttmacher Institute,
says one in four
  U.S. pregnancies ends in abortion today as compared to 1980, when the
figure was one in
  three. Researchers at the institute say greater contraceptive use is
largely responsible for the
  decline.

  They say women who are under age 25, separated, never married, poor or
members of a
  minority group are roughly twice as likely to have an abortion as other
women of
  childbearing age. About half of all pregnancies are unintended, and half
of those end in
  abortion, the institute says.

  Cory Richards, vice president of public policy at Guttmacher, said of the
paper: "This is not
  an argument for abortion per se. This is an argument for women not being
forced to have
  children they don't want to have. This is making the point that it's not
only bad for the
  women, but for children and society."

  David O'Steen, executive director of the National Right to life Committee
in Washington,
  D.C., described the thesis as bizarre. "I can't believe that any
significant percent of the
  population would argue that we should kill unborn babies to affect
whatever they say is
  being affected," he said.

  A spokesman for the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action
League declined to
  comment until members of the organization had had the opportunity to
study the paper.

  "No one will like it," said Levitt, but "I don't think it's our job as
economists or scientists to
  withhold truth because some people are not going to like it. I just think
it's important to
  understand the impact of social policies."

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