Why does N.Y. prioritize abortion over life-changing child care?

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November 5th is approaching in New York, when we will be asked to vote on new language to New York’s Constitution known as the Equal Rights Amendment.

Called Prop One, additions against “unequal treatment based on race, color, creed, and religion” are protections against the discrimination of what is labeled “pregnancy, and pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy,” among other categories. 

Supporters of Prop One claim the amendment will be used to enshrine a woman’s right to abortion into the New York State constitution. 

In a podcast episode from the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), the Executive Director of the New York Abortion Access Fund said our state’s unlimited and unrestricted abortion is not enough. Funding is needed for those who do not qualify for Medicaid or who come from out-of-state. In other words, no matter your income level or what state you live in, we will pay for your abortion.

New York State is already a major provider of abortion, and is ranked number two in providing the most abortions nationwide, even to out-of-staters.

Following the overturn of Roe v. Wade, Attorney General Letitia James’ introduced “The Reproductive Freedom and Equity Program,” which would “support access to abortion for low-income New Yorkers and would also provide financial support for the influx of people coming to New York from other states that ban abortion.”

New York State Senator, Chuck Schumer, echoed James in introducing federal support for out-of-state abortion seekers.  

This year’s New York budget saw over $100 million allocated for increasing abortion. $36 million was earmarked directly to abortion businesses to increase access. $25 million was funding a program to establish New York as an abortion “safe haven” for out-of-staters. There was even a one-time $10 million grant to “enhance security and safety operations” for abortion businesses.

With such open commitment from so many New York lawmakers in expanding abortion state-wide, we know that our tax-payer dollars are funding abortions for anyone from anywhere.

A likely consequence of state constitutional abortion rights means that these tax-payer funded abortion programs will not just continue, but increase. More importantly, it will be a violation of the state constitution to deny them.  

Money is not infinite. Therefore, could this abortion funding be at the expense of state programs that actually benefit women, such as childcare and tax credits?  

The 2023 Affordable Child Care Study conducted by the New York State Assembly discovered that New York parents generally lack access to affordable, quality childcare. In New York City alone, “State funding will only cover 15% or 10,800 out of 72,000 of … eligible families.”

One of the programs that currently provide free or low-cost child care to poor families, is the NYS Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP). According to the justification of the CCAP, “only 22% of income-eligible families are receiving subsidies.” Single-parents are especially marginalized in this area. According to Pew Research Center, the vast majority (87%) of women who had abortions in 2021 were unmarried. 

On top of this, child poverty rates in New York State are on the rise and exceed national rates. According to a 2024 report by State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli, nearly one out of five children live in poverty. 

Meanwhile, the Robin Hood Foundation and Columbia University’s Center on Poverty and Social Policy published a 2024 report showing that the child poverty rate in New York jumped by 66%, rising from 15% to 25%, between 2021 and 2022, despite the federal child poverty rate decreasing from 46% to 5.2% following the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) in 2021. 

Because of the amazing success the American Rescue Plan Act had in alleviating child poverty rates on a national scale, we can reasonably assume the same outcome would happen on a state level if such was proposed in New York state, and it has been. 

In 2023, the New York State Senate Finance Committee and New York State Assembly Ways and Means Committee proposed a state law called the Working Families Tax Credit, which would provide working families a maximum tax credit of $1,500 per child, and regardless of income, a minimum credit of $500 per child. The bills were introduced in response to the federal government’s unwillingness to recently renew an expanded version of the child tax credits in ARPA, but the New York State Legislature has failed to pass the bill. 

There are real solutions to alleviate financial stress on mothers and children being proposed in the state of New York, but they are not a priority in the state legislature. Why does New York care more about prioritizing the funding of a procedure that ends a human life, than it does the funding towards life-changing child care that protects and financially provides for already born and alive children?

Sarah Prentice
Deputy outreach coordinator, Feminists Choosing Life of NY

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5 thoughts on “Why does N.Y. prioritize abortion over life-changing child care?

  1. The promise of America is we are not supposed to deny any group equal and human rights, and the costs to enforce those rights, because there is another worthy cause where the money can be spent. The claim that we are engaged in ” funding a procedure that ends a human life ” is a lie and religious propaganda. A fertilized egg is not a person per science. The view of this writer begins to be carried to the extreme by the Catholic Church with Martin Luther and the Reformation where it is the duty of Catholics to bring as many new Catholics as possible into the world. This and other religious mandates would be enforced by the Inquisition where BORN people were tortured and murdered by the thousands in Europe. These views and worse were brought to Americas during the Age of Exploration and used to justify the treatment of Native Americans and captured Africans. The failure to bring as many Catholics into the world as possible resulted in birth control and consensual sex outside of marriage to be the same sin as abortion, with a sentence of hell for eternity. Interestingly, the Southern (white) Baptist Convention, led by Jerry Falwell, affirmed a woman’s right to abortion in 1972 and 1974, the year before Roe and after Roe, and again in 1976, supported by all the fundamentalist big money preachers. In 1978 President Carter had his Attorney General sue Bob Jones University under the 1964 Civil Rights Act for being whites only. Carter won and millions in federal dollars for the college had to be returned and income shielded by religion from taxes had to pay the taxes and penalties. They went nuts, especially Jerry Falwell whose Liberty College also did not admit Blacks. These Christian leaders did not see their tax status as subsidies, but their entitlements. Only then, and by 1980, did Falwell and the others join with the Catholics in their extremist views on abortion in an attempt to regain political right-wing moral advantage, something they lost in the eyes of most Americans in opposing MLK and Civil Rights. For men that have bought this and are Prolife, you might consider that pregnancy starts with a penis, and you might not want that appendage regulated by the government. I for one, am thankful that all most women want is equality, and not revenge.
    I for one favor no special rules for religion on taxes. Freedom of religion in private only so others who wish are free from religion. Save tax money from the military budget by promoting this worldwide as I have yet to find a war between agnostics and atheists.

    • Addendum: Today,10/25/24, I found in my mailbox a one-page flyer to ” VOTE NO TO THE ERA”. This was marked as from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester with the official insignia of the diocese. It is exactly the same, word for word, that is on the official website of the Roman Catholic Diocese. It appears it was in every mailbox, and I suspect it was county wide. It contained no postage, which is a violation of federal law. It is not enough that taxpayers pay the churches share of taxes for infrastructure and other government services they enjoy, but in their view, they probably view free postal services as an entitlement. I will report this to Postal Inspectors, but I’m sure the Church will claim they had no idea this was going on. This is the same claim they always make in court, that they had no idea their priests were sexually assaulting and raping children for decades, a claim proven to be a lie in courts everywhere. I believe they just paid out about $ 880 million in Los Angelos to the victims of their crimes against children. Vote YES on the ERA.

  2. While Ms. Prentice offers cogent, well-documented arguments for her point of view, there is another side to that coin. What if all the women from NY and other places were to be forced to bring their fetus to term, especially if that fetus has congenital life-threatening defects, or comes into the world in an impoverished household, or even worse, to a neglectful or hurtful environment unwanted and uncared for? What, then, would the costs be? Is there a way to monetize suffering and the multiplication of costs over the lifetime of dysfunction?
    It’s a manipulative and narrowly focused calculus that monies earmarked for women’s health services could be reallocated to child care by adding more children to the population.
    On the legislative side, our elected representatives do an excellent job of reflecting the values and needs of most New Yorkers. They keep getting re-elected. So, after at least two legislative sessions, our elected representatives are doing our bidding. Although it adds to our financial burden only a tiny amount, there is no reason we can’t prioritize women’s health care AND programs to support children and families. Without question, if more than fifty years of precedent had been upheld by SCOTUS, which went against most citizens’ wishes to keep women’s health care legal in all respects and universally available, there would be no added cost to New York’s taxpayers because they would get the services they need and deserve anywhere in the country.
    The opponents of Proposition One are making so many specious arguments that I can’t help but sense their desperate effort to go against the will of the majority once again. It is their go-to strategy.
    Vote YES on Proposition One, and enshrine everyone’s rights in New York, once and for all.

  3. Sarah,
    NYS is providing access to abortion care. It isn’t prioritizing it. The bill you referred to hasn’t made it out of committee. That’s not quite the same as failing to pass the bill.
    Perhaps if the federal government had not been unwilling to renew an expanded version of the child tax credits in ARPA and the supreme court had not taken away the right to an abortion, this would be a different discussion. Women are going to get abortions. You aren’t going to change that. Their choice now is to come to NY or one of the states that allows abortions for a SAFE abortion or get an unsafe one. NY wouldn’t be overburdened with people from out of state ( and not need the high funding amount) if all states allowed safe abortions.

  4. The question should be why not do both? Recognize and support a woman’s right to autonomy, be she a resident of arbitrary state borders, and also do better by children? Unless there is another agenda, caring for women and children shouldn’t be a zero sum proposition.

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