Abortion bans cost the US economy billions of dollars in lost labor and productivity

When the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, it was clear that the reproductive rights of millions of Americans would be affected. What wasn’t accounted for was the financial hit the country would take as a result of state bans and restrictions on abortion. 

According to new analysis from the nonprofit Institute for Women’s Policy Research think tank, the 16 states with abortion bans and the most severe restrictions are costing the country $68 billion annually in lost labor force, lower labor earnings, lost work hours and higher employee turnover. 

The report measured each state’s cost from January 2021 to December 2023, pulling data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and research from the Guttmacher Institute.

“When a person is not able to get the health care that they need, including abortion, they are unable to lead productive lives and show up to work and fully participate in society,” Jamila Taylor, president and CEO of the Institute for Women’s Policy Research said. 

“A lack of the right to abortion is hampering women’s labor force participation, particularly women of reproductive age, so we’re talking about women that are between the ages of 15 to 44. So that is where that $68 billion number comes from,” Taylor explained. 

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Division of Reproductive Health defines the “reproductive age” of a woman as between 15 and 44.  

In Texas, for example, there is an average annual loss of over $20 billion. Washington, D.C., which protects abortion rights without gestational restrictions, lost just over $90 million, according to the report. 

Around 360,588 women would be in the labor force if it were not for abortion restrictions starting in June 2022, the Institute’s research found, and their labor would have increased the national gross domestic product by over 1.3% through June 2024.

“I think it’s just a very important argument to be made about what the impacts — it’s in the context of women’s lives, of course, but what the broader impacts are, which I think is really important, and how we think about policymaking,” Taylor said. 

Taylor said the report isn’t simply about labor participation, but also about women’s earnings since Roe was reversed.

Employed women ages 15 to 44 would have earned an additional $8.07 billion in 2023 had so many of abortion restrictions not been in place nationwide, according to the report. 

“I was just watching the news this morning about how inflation is starting to subside and the economy is — we’re in a moment where it’s turning around. And so connecting those trends to something like abortion rights in certain parts of the country I think is really important and should be a part of a conversation,” Taylor said.

Despite massive restrictions and bans, more than 1 million abortions were officially performed in the United States in 2023, the highest number in over a decade, according to the Guttmacher Institute.