The Impact of State Abortion Restrictions on Minors' Demand for Abortions

Abstract

This study uses a weighted least squares model and a fixed-effects model to estimate the impact of parental consent laws and laws governing Medicaid funding of abortions on the adolescents demand for abortion in the United States during 1978-90. The focus is on adolescent pregnancy because 12% of total legal abortions in 1987 were to adolescents aged under 18 years. The rate of abortion and types of abortion law range widely between states. Data are obtained from the US Center for Disease Control on reported abortions from the NARAL Foundation on the dates of actual enforcement restrictions and from the Alan Guttmacher Institute on abortion providers. The empirical model is based on a model developed by Grossman and Joyce. Proxy measures are used to represent abortion sentiment. Fixed effects models indicated that there was a decline of 13-17% in adolescents demand for abortion in states with enforced parental involvement laws compared to states without enforced laws. The results implied a 9-15% decline in adolescents demand for abortion in states that restricted Medicaid funding of abortion compared to states that did not. There was a positive association between abortion demand and income and between abortion demand and the availability of abortion providers. The inclusion of the abortion sentiment proxies did not change the signs and magnitudes of the impact very much in the fixed-effects models. It is posited that the negative impacts of abortion restrictions on adolescent abortion demand cannot be attributed to unobserved heterogeneity. Four methods of modeling are used to account for the potential role of unobserved heterogeneity.