Dear John, Where Are The Jobs in H. R. 3?

When the American people elected a majority Republican House of Representatives last November, they did so because they wanted representatives in Congress who would listen to the mandate of the people that long-term job creation was the most important thing to the American people. Additionally, the people mandated that they wanted the deficit to be reduced without hikes in taxes. The new Speaker, Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) said he would make job creation a priority. Even President Obama, in The Wall Street Journal and in his State of the Union address, championed supply-side economic principles with a strength not seen since the administration of Ronald Reagan in order to to reduce the deficit and create jobs.

The Republicans started out pretty well. They read the Constitution aloud to start the 112th Congress and implemented new rules to ensure bills have to be Constitutional to be brought before the House. H. R. 2 was a measure to repeal an act passed by the previous Congress that would kill jobs and was not wanted by a majority of the country.

H. R. 3 is the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act," and while it sounds like it would save tax dollars by preventing taxpayer funds from going to pay for abortions, it actually will cost the taxpayers more.

When a woman becomes pregnant, there are a few basic outcomes that can happen. The first possible outcome is that a woman carries the child for a period (usually around 9 months) and gives birth to a baby. The second possible outcome is a natural or unwanted failure of the pregnancy, such as a miscarriage. The third outcome is that the pregnancy is intentionally ended, which is known as an abortion.

While H. R. 3 would prohibit taxpayer funding for an abortion, it would still allow taxpayer funding for the labor and delivery of a baby. As illustrated below, using a low-range figure for the cost of labor and delivery, it is far cheaper for the taxpayers to fund a woman having an abortion, or even a dozen abortions, than to fund having a child:

From a pure economic sense, and for lowering the deficit, it seems that the government ought to actually encourage abortion instead of having children for people on government healthcare. It also is the case that many children who are born will have much of their costs not paid for by their parents, but paid for via government welfare programs, creating greater burden on the American taxpayer.

Worse, H. R. 3 does not create a single job. There is no mention of the word "job" or "jobs" in the bill. If anything, it kills jobs because a reduction in demand for abortions will put abortion doctors, nurses, and counselors out of business. Jobless, they'll also seek unemployment benefits that are funded by taxpayers.

At this point, with unemployment still over 9 percent, H. R. 3 just is not the type of bill that Congress needs to pass. The American people need Congress to focus on passing job-creating bills, not job-killing bills.