Should America adopt a policy that any citizen can get access to any statistically viable (say, > 95% success when properly used) form of birth control for free? It seems to me that unwanted children in a society cost a considerable amount of money in both actual dollars and hidden costs. For example, Freakanomics made a fairly compelling case that legalized abortion reduced the crime rate. My feeling is that assuring everyone access to free birth control would reduce the number of unwanted children, especially amongst the poor where unwanted children are the biggest risk (just an opinion, no cite sorry). As for implementation, it would be easy enough to have condom dispensers available to the public. Getting access to Depo or the pill would probably require some paperwork at a Planned Parenthood type place.
Does this sound like a worthwhile thing to investigate? How much would it cost society to implement this? Has anyone tried to quantify the social costs of unwanted children? Obviously there has to be some solid sex ed to ensure kids are aware of their options, but I really think this would have a number of legitimate benefits to society.
Every Planned Parenthood I’ve ever been in has bowls of free condoms - male and female - free for the taking on the counters and in the waiting rooms. Many also have dental dams, which I have to admit I’ve never used.
I think it’s a fine idea. Heck, I’m almost willing to make it compulsory!
I’m not. I read science fiction where it works, and science fiction where there is conflict between those who limit the number of childre who can be born to a person and those who don’t (and sometimes science fiction where it works badly), but I’m not willing to implement compulsory universal birth control.
And I’m not all that keen on Free Universal Birth Control, either. Probably a mix of my puritanical Universal Birth Control promotes Sex without Consequences, which is just immoral and wrong, and a strong Free-Will element of I’m not convinced that most people who concieve unwanted babies couldn’t find free or low cost birth control if they wanted to and they just don’t want to.
Forget about universal birth control; let’s just worry about this planet.
For this to be a good idea, there would have to be a substantial number of people now who would be using birth control except that they can’t afford it, or don’t want to shell out the money. I don’t know whether or not that’s true.
For this to be an implementable idea, well… If it’s America that adopts the policy, America’s going to have to pay for it. And you’d see too much resistance from the people who object to birth control in general, and the people who object to providing birth control to people they think ought not be having sex (because they’re not married, or are too young, or are too promiscuous, or whatever), and those who think, “If they wanna have sex so bad, let 'em spring for a condom themselves. Why should I have to pay my hard-eaarned money so they can get their jollies?” Rather than make it official government policy to provide free birth control, it might be more fruitful to donate to private organizations (like Planned Parenthood) so they could provide it.
A lot of people are too embarrassed to be seen obtaining birth control–especially the kind that requires a prescription–for fear of being given the Evil Eye by those who think that they are being “just immoral and wrong”.
Birth control is always cheaper than a baby. It’s cheaper than supporting a family on welfare. Planned parenthood does provide this now, but I think if you are under 18 you may have problems without an adults consent. I thought P.P. was federally funded, but I may be wrong on that. I agree that reducing the number of unwanted children is a good idea and we should continue to support programs like P.P.
I had to get my birth control there for years simply because my insurance quit covering it (though they continued to cover abortion and pregnancy- guess they had to)
This one is tricky but there comes a time when you can’t sit around and complain that things aren’t the way they should be and deal with how things are. Kids ARE having sex and we need to accept it and act accordingly. The best you can do is instill values in your own child and hope they listen. I’m not sure that OP is even referring to minors being given access to free birth control (which is usually what I hear complaints about), it sounds like he just means people in general. If you are 18 we can’t stop you from having sex anyway so you might as well be smart about it.
Right, and me neither, in this reality. Hence the “Heck” “almost” and the smiley. In The World When I Am Queen, no one would ever have to get pregnant OR get someone else pregnant without planning it, and having everyone on blanket birth control until an antidote was sought would be one way to do that. Not to mention my more cynical moments when I think some sort of parenting test and license should be obtained before the antidote is granted. But in real life, such a system would just be too rife with corruption, and eventually only the wealthy would be allowed to breed, which I would never endorse.
Actually, when I think about it some more, I wonder if making free birth control more available might lead to MORE anti-abortion, anti welfare and anti state child assistance laws and attitudes - after all, if the birth control was provided for with taxpayer money, then The Bitch really “deserves” what she gets if she doesn’t use it or doesn’t use it right and why should we bail her out when she gets knocked up? Completely ignores birth control failure as a possibility of course, but I can see people going there. So there’s a little straw man for ya. Tilt away.
But when they go there, the need to keep in mind she didn’t get pregnant all by herself.
I think you may have a point here with abortion, but not with welfare or child assistance laws simply because we aren’t going to punish the child for having stupid parents.
it won’t work, financially, mostly, but legally, government supplied contraception that failed would almost certainly result in lawsuits for even higher levels of government child support since what they gave you to prevent this from happening failed.
That said, I’m all for as much proliferation of birth control as possible.
Forget America. Instead of dropping bombs we should be dropping condoms and BC pills on the developing world. I think that would be much more cost effective and head off a lot of problems in the future. Besides, they can be truly said to be needy in this area – when you need to spend most of your income just to make it through the day you’re not going to spend it on something as superflous as BC. Or, more likely, even have a store or clinic to go to that supplies such a thing.
Um, the same people who pay for the welfare recipients today? I’m not saying there are Welfare queens or not, but it’d be cheaper than the government giving money to parents too irresponsible to plan a family.
The Government, which I thought I was implying in the OP. Obviously those funds are going to have to come from somewhere, just as when any new government program breaks ground, and no I can’t say exactly which programs should get cut to fund this. If I saw the complete federal budget I am sure I could offer suggestions.
I’m not asking if it is politically feasable, the question I’m asking is should this country be more aggressive with dispensing birth control? Would this result in a net positive for our society? And yes I mean even to people under 18.
I disagree, and thats one of the reasons I like this idea. I think there are people who don’t use BC because they aren’t sure how to go about it, and they are scared to ask and it’s awkward so they just put it out of their minds until one night they wind up in bed with someone and it just sorta happens. I think if the government was more assertive about getting people - especially younger people - BC there would be less of this. I’m talking like goimg to high schools and jumping up and down and yellimg “USE BIRTH CONTROL YOU DUMMIES” if necessary. I’d happily risk encouraging a little more promiscuity if it meant that it was being done intelligently.
I think it would be a net positive, just as you suggest. My first law job was doing child support collection for the State. I’ve met way too many 30 year old grandmothers. Just pessimistic about chances of it happening.
The same people who are going to pay no matter what happens; the general public. Whether it’s for birth control, schools or prison cells, they will pay; the only choice is how much and what for.
They need women’s rights and sex education before birth control will do much good. Having birth control available isn’t much use if a woman is going to be assaulted or killed or even just divorced for using it or asking her man to do so. It’s also not much use if people like the Catholic Church have filled them with lies about it.
Valid point, but I’d also note that some of these people will also be getting free BC themselves. People vote their pocket book and it could very well save them money.
With that being SAID, I don’t think it would have as much of an impact as we’d like for the mere fact that, as some have mentioned, Planned Parenthood basically gives out free birth control ALREADY. In large part it’s already AVAILABLE for free. Yes, some people are nervous or shy about asking for it, but how would that change?
Having a bin with free condoms in one building per 100k+ pop city is one thing, having condom bins in many public restrooms, plus billboards and subway ads posting addresses, websites, and phone #s to call to get access to any number of different types of birth control (much like I’ve seen for things like Hepetitis but for some reason never for BC), plus active presence in high schools is something else.
I concede that, on the surface, it seems like a very subtle change, but I really think that going from a society where BC is accepted or tolerated to one where it is actively suggested and encouraged would result in a large reduction of unwanted children. The thing is, how much would it cost versus how much we spend now. Thats where I’m fuzzy, I don’t know if studies have been done to quantify this kind of thing.
Recognized (by the format, as you say), but it was as good a jumping off point as any.
That is arguably a problem. Although part of me says that if you are too embarassed to be seen obtaining birth control, you have no business doing anything which might make birth control a good idea. (This is separate from my previous immoral and wrong comment).
But it is part of why I have much less problem with persons who want to make birth control more accessible, than with those who want universal birth control. And I’m not an advocate of abstinence-only programs in schools. Teach teenagers about the risks of sex and how to reduce them. Treat it like knowledge that everyone should have, and the earlier they get it the better. Leave the moral part of sex without marriage is bad for the moral teachers (Parents, Preachers, and Sunday School Teachers). But don’t act like sex is something as neccessary to life as food and water.
Not everyone is having sex. People who act like the only people who aren’t having sex are weird rub me severely the wrong way. This may just show that I’m weird. So be it. I can live with that.
But since not everyone is having sex, not everyone needs birth control. And everyone needs to take responsibility for his or her own actions.
FWIW, I remember a conversation with a US AID worker in China about 10 years ago. He said that free birth control was viewed as having little to no value. Highly subsidized and extremely affordable birth control that still required some sort of payment was of orders of magnitude higher value.
