The underprivileged do not require birth control in order to survive. Should we buy them cars and houses too?

As far as cars and homes, well...there is program to turn in your old car. It is repaired and sold(very small price or possible free) to the needy. I will not say this program has been exploited yet as I have not investigated. As far as homes, section 8 housing. Very cheap or sometimes free. Food stamps. Free cell phones. So yes, let's toss in some condoms or morning after pills. The state of MD will go as far as paying your electric bill if you show just cause. Usually some trumped up hard luck case. I know, my near do well brother in law got his $1200.00 bill paid. Let's make a party of it. Free goods for all! :woot:

Stupid people will breed like rabits.
I'd rather see €10 of my monthly taxes go for the pills than €200 for their large families. Or watch the news full of some poor sods that can't take care of their 12 kids.

That poor sod's problem(can't keep it in his pants) has now become my problem. Is it just me or is there a underlying problem here? I find little amusement in supporting someones 5 minutes of good time(resulting pregnancy) in the back of a car or wherever. Even with every contraception device known to man left in his wallet, under the sink, in his car or at the planned parenthood agency the end result is the same. The entire nation supporting the sod's indiscretions. In short, were does it stop? Why does society continue to pander to the nonsense? The problems are never fixed. The just offer another serviced that comes out of tax money.

Lesser evil and all that jazz :shifty:

But then you could also be pragmatic about it - say your choice is giving the poor sod a few hundred dollars' worth of tax-subsidized pills, or thousands upon thousands of dollars in subsidies for supporting the kids. Or you don't support the kids, in which case there is a high chance that said kids will, without supervision, turn to gangs. That creates some serious problems for the average taxpayer. And then assuming the police do their job, said kids end up in jail, where they only cost more taxpayer money. And if you prefer shooting them on sight as an alternative, then you risk seriously eroding civil rights that your very society is founded on. I know this is a bit of a slippery slope, but either way the fact is that there is a direct link to far more serious social problems here, social problems that in one way or another will always cost you (or your fellow law-abiding, tax-paying citizen) something.

The problem is that "some sod's indiscretions" are, unfortunately, never just that sod's problem. That doesn't make him right to behave the way he does, but by virtue of living in a human society, you always end up paying in one way or another. And if you don't, somebody else pays in your stead. Sad maybe, but a fact.

So, you know, maybe those "free" pills aren't such a bad solution from a cost-effectiveness standpoint...

The sod is given pills and thousands of dollars for his kids. First problem, he has kids. He/she is not using the pill. Second problem, by and large the sod spends the money on anything but his kids. He can use the card for alcohol, cigarettes, lottery, gambling or a new pair if Air Jordan shoes. I have witnessed this type of spending at the cash registers. The sod can not be forced to take pills/condoms and use them. Nor can he be forced to spend money on his kids.

Welcome to absentee parenting. It had been a ongoing problem for decades.

That is a understatement of the highest degree.

You see a recurring theme here?

Like Hillary Clinton said, "It takes a village to raise a child." Problem is, some of the villagers do not contribute back.


Not if the sod is not using the pills and other contraceptives. Again, they are not forced to use contraceptives. However, I suspect there are quite a few that do utilize the program. I do not have the statistics. There is no clear cut answer to the issue at hand.

Great points. Saves me from having to type them out.

You can try an idealist and bang the "personal responsibility" drum and watch the crime rate soar, or you can be a realist and invest a pittance into making birth control easily accessible to all. Easy choice to me.

Which is simply saying we tried. The problem still persists. There is more than mere pittance spent on birth control. It is the other items that subsidize these folk. The ones that make a career out of working the system. The rolls continue to swell.

And still watch the crime rate soar because birth control is not related to poverty or crime.

:yep:

Source?

Because peer-reviewed academic research certainly suggests otherwise.

Examples:
http://pricetheory.uchicago.edu/levi...alized2001.pdf
http://socserv.socsci.mcmaster.ca/bj...nindyaSen1.pdf
http://www.springerlink.com/content/c7072230p7201016/

CCIP,

These articles deal with abortion and crime. Is abortion a contraception device or form of birth control? Generally the pill, condoms, foam, IUD and the like are birth control. Abortion is after the fact. The birth was not controlled.

Besides in their attempt to prove their point they reject the more (to me) likely reasons for the drop in crime rates

IE

That's an awful lot to dismiss in favor of one single cause. Some of the things also not mentioned are gun control laws and social programs designed to help inner city youths.

Well, all of those articles address "reduction in fertility rates", and for two of them that's actually a central point. Reduction in fertility rates = the pill, in the vast majority of cases.

I'm not arguing for this as a magic and completely fair solution, by the way. But pragmatically, there is a connection between fertility rates, unwanted pregnancy, and crime rates. Now, I haven't found a cost-benefit analysis and I'd be curious about that - but I really suspect that at the end of the day, it is not a bad deal. As far as cost to society, more people on birth control is automatically more economical than the next-best options, including doing nothing.

What is possible to argue is that it's unfair and unethical to support something you don't agree with, and to pay for something that you believe people should be providing for themselves. The ethical argument for not paying other people to have more sex without consequences with money that you earned with your own hard work is still perfectly valid.

August: I'm not sure how far you read into these, but none of the articles dismiss other factors as far as I could tell. Even the most "cocky" one of the three only suggests that legal abortion accounts for "only" 50% of the drop, with good arguments for where those other 50% are. The others are even more conservative. And these are just 3 examples of many. As I said, the only thing I've not found is a cost-benefit analysis about subsidized pills specifically.