“So abortion will still be legal in most states, but it will certainly be harder to get one in many places and this will mean fewer abortions. That raises many political, legal and moral issues that don’t have easy answers.  But one thing is certain — it will have an economic impact since it affects low-income women most.

The typical abortion recipient is in her 20s, single, already has at least one child and is living below the poverty line. A common perception is that most abortion recipients are teenagers, but survey data from 2008 to 2014 estimates only 12% were between the age of 15 and 19 — the same percentage as women over 35 who sought the procedure. Nearly 60% were in their 20s, 55% were not married or living with a partner, 49.4% live below the poverty line, and 59% already had at least one child.

Abortion access reduces the odds a young woman will have an unwanted child early in her life, which are the crucial years that set her economic trajectory. In a review of data collected over the decades after changes in abortion laws in the 1970s, economists found that access to abortion reduced the odds of dropping out of school, being unmarried and living in poverty — especially among Black women.”