more on Pregnant Women Support Act

Thanks to Rick for his positive comments on the Pregnant Women Support Act.  He asks whether I

would agree that it would not necessarily be "telling and disturbing" for a conservative to oppose a particular measure that was presented by its supporters as part of an effort to reduce abortions?  I do not think it should necessarily be seen as allowing "knee-jerk hostility" to spending to trump concern for unborn children to raise questions about the effectiveness of programs like, say, WIC [Supplemental Nutrition for Women, Infants, and Children, for which the bill would increase funding].

I certainly agree that we ought to examine the effectiveness of government assistance programs, and that to call for such examination and reexamination is not "knee-jerk hostility."  At the same time, would Rick agree with the following:  Given that many programs have some but not total success, making the question one of weighing costs and benefits, the bar ought not to be set too high when the program bears on the question whether women will perceive themselves able to take care of their children, born and unborn.  (The connection between such perceptions and abortion is plain: studies show that the perceived inability to afford to raise a child, often an additional child, is the first or second most frequent and most influential reason women give for having had abortions, and not surprisingly abortion rates are disproportionately high among the poor (with the disparities growing).)

If there is no claim that a particular assistance program is counterproductive, and the questions about it are only whether its benefits come at too high a cost, then I'd think that pro-life citizens and voters should weigh the benefits of potentially reducing abortions as quite high, justifying substantial social expenditures.  (Not unlimited, of course, but substantial.)  This should follow, shouldn't it, from the belief that abortion is the greatest, or among the greatest, moral tragedies or scandals in America today.

I note that the American Enterprise Institute study to which Rick links, according to its summary page, does not conclude that WIC is altogether ineffective, let alone counterproductive, but only that claims for its cost-benefit savings -- in terms of reduced Medicaid expenditures -- have been significantly exaggerated, and that the findings call for reforms but not for "abandoning or even cutting the program."  The study also recognizes that the most "needful families . . . see[m] to benefit most from WIC," and that supporting decent nutrition "for even a small number of children, especially poor childre[n] -- without harming others and without exorbitant spending -- would be an ethical benefit not captured in purely economic benefit-cost calculations" (a recognition that ought also to apply to potential reductions in abortion from assistance programs).  Finally, the summary page indicates that other researchers on WIC (from whom the AEI researchers commendably solicited responses) argue that, although some reforms are appropriate, the AEI study is "overly pessimistic about the program's impact."  Considering the qualified nature of these criticisms of WIC -- just one part of the overall proposal -- it seems to me that for these questions to block the overall package on such an important matter as reducing abortions would make the tail wag the dog.  It would indeed be "telling and disturbing."

Tom