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Teen childbearing costs $9.1 billion a year, UD prof finds
1:26 p.m., Nov. 6, 2006--Saul Hoffman, chairperson of UD's Department of Economics and professor of economics and women's studies, is the author of a new report, “By the Numbers: The Public Costs of Teen Childbearing,” released by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the well-being of children, youth and families by reducing teen pregnancy. The first comprehensive national estimate of the public costs of teen childbearing since a 1996 study, the report found that teen childbearing in the United States cost taxpayers approximately $9.1 billion in 2004 and that estimated cumulative public costs for teen childbearing between 1991 and 2004 totaled $161 billion, despite a one-third decline nationally in the teen birth rate since the early 1990s. According to Hoffman, one of the reasons the study was conducted “was to show that despite how much [has been] accomplished, there are still huge costs that are potentially avoidable. Teen birth rates in the U.S., despite the decline, are still four to six times the rates in most of Western Europe and twice as high as Canada.” The study tracks the costs associated with health care, foster care, the child welfare system, food stamps, the prison system and lower tax revenue for the government. The most important costs are those associated with the children of teen mothers, who have higher health care costs and lower earnings and are more likely to be in the foster care system and in prison. “We have a better handle now on the kinds of programs that can be successful to delay first births,” Hoffman said. “What everybody always wants to know is: 'Are they worth it?' This [study] is a way of providing policymakers with that information, because it tells them what the costs are of those births.” Hoffman's analysis provides a “conservative estimate” of the costs of teen childbearing and reflects only those costs clearly associated with a teen birth, rather than other associated risks that may lead to poorer outcomes, Hoffman said. Hoffman added that a state-by-state analysis also shows how Delaware lines up statistically. “The other part of this study was to generate separate estimates of the costs to each state,” Hoffman said, “and the cost for Delaware for 2004 is $28 million.” More information about the findings is available online at [www.teenpregnancy.org/costs]. Funding for the study was made possible by a grant from the William T. Grant Foundation. Article by Becca Hutchinson |
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