Amidst the health care debacle and the ensuing arguments over the last 2 years, a few themes have been recurring: women’s health care rights. There has been a huge movement to, in the new health care law provisions, grant all women access to birth control for free. But who is going to pay for this?

According to the US Census, 2010, there were 308,745,538 {documented} people in the United States. 50.8% of those people were women (156,842,733) and studies show that roughly 80% of women have used birth control at some point. So…125,474,186 women. Granted, not all of those women would concurrently be taking birth control, so let’s take Age 2000 estimates of 81.5 million women ages 15-49. According to US News-Money, birth control pills cost on average $160 to $600 annually. On the low end, you’re looking at:
      $160/year X 81.5 million women= $13,040,000,000 A YEAR!

Fighting for exceptions to allow for coverage for the pill for women who suffer from disorders is one thing. An argument claiming that all women should have the pill covered – at the expenses of others- for them is another. Women already have free access to birth control – it’s called saying no, or at least “not until you put a condom on”. Why should taxpayers, who morally and religiously don’t agree with the concept, be forced to pay for others’ irresponsibility? Okay, that’s a tangent. Bottom line: It’s too expensive!!!

Avoiding pregnancy is not a difficult concept to grasp. It really pushes on the concept of necessities versus luxuries, or rights and privileges.  Don’t get me wrong: I believe people should have the access to whatever contraception they deem appropriate (i.e.- birth control should not be banned) however, it cannot be at the expense of taxpayers.

This brings up another interesting aspect that is often forgotten: Nonprofits. Nonprofit organizations are supposed to be the bridge between the public and private sector. They often fail because they seek federal grant money which muddies the water of religion, morals, etc. (Example: Planned Parenthood using federal monies). If nonprofits sought private donations and provided to these underprivileged women, it would no longer be a burden on the taxpayers nor would be a government issue. To go full circle, the government has no business in health care especially if you look at it from a simple financial standpoint.

I like one rebuttal to the feminist notion that women are entitled to birth control: “Frankly, it paints a pretty dim view of women to claim that they need access to the pill in order to prevent unwanted pregnancies. They should be strong enough and smart enough on their own to avoid doing that before they are ready.”