Most conservatives vehemently oppose public funding of abortion directly via government outlays and ardently support the Hyde Amendment which restricted such government spending. This issue has come to the fore because several dozen Democratic Members of the House of Representatives have joined Rep. Bart Stupak in trying to strip abortion funding from health care reform.
But aren’t these legislators ignoring huge federal subsidies for abortion through the taxA tax is a mandatory payment or charge collected by local, state, and national governments from individuals or businesses to cover the costs of general government services, goods, and activities. code?
Currently, the tax exclusion for employer-provided health insurance is an implicit subsidy for private health insurance plans, many of which cover abortion procedures. Similarly, the itemized deductionItemized deductions allow individuals to subtract designated expenses from their taxable income and can be claimed in lieu of the standard deduction. Itemized deductions include those for state and local taxes, charitable contributions, and mortgage interest. An estimated 13.7 percent of filers itemized in 2019, most being high-income taxpayers. for medical and dental expenses allows the cost of abortion procedures to be deducted. In other words, the current tax system is indirectly subsidizing abortion procedures, which causes higher tax rates on other income or reduced government spending. (Either way, the tax policy is not “abortion-neutral.”)
Conservatives often support any type of tax cut as a rule of thumb, but suppose some liberal member of Congress proposed a separate itemized deduction for abortion expenditures – there would be some social conservative outrage. But in fact, we already have such a deduction, and although it’s currently limited (must exceed 7.5% of AGI), some conservatives favor getting rid of this limitation (like Congressman Ron Paul’s proposal) because they see it as a tax cut.
I know many conservatives would quibble with this, arguing that a tax cut is technically different than an outlay (i.e. the legal classification by CBO). But last year during the presidential campaign, John McCain proposed overhauling the exclusion of employer-provided health insurance into a refundable tax creditA refundable tax credit can be used to generate a federal tax refund larger than the amount of tax paid throughout the year. In other words, a refundable tax credit creates the possibility of a negative federal tax liability. An example of a refundable tax credit is the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). , a large fraction of which would have legally been classified as an outlay (i.e. government spending). In other words, Sen. McCain proposed government spending for people to buy private health insurance plans, some of which presumably covered abortion procedures. He just called it a tax cut.
So my question is: If the Hyde/Stupak Amendment, which says that government should not be directly financing abortions or insurance plans that cover abortion, is good public policy, what about indirect subsidies via the tax system that also lower the costs of abortion at the expense of others?
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