I propose the abolition of widely-available abortion in the United States, and the creation of a frankly socialist conception-to-preschool safety net.
I do not propose absolute abolition. Such an abolition is not generally possible in a world where humans have individual volition. Bless us, we do.
The exceptions that ought to be made involve rape, pregnancies that are likely to kill or severely incapacitate the mother, or pregnancies involving girls of very young age (11 or younger).
Any other woman who becomes pregnant is expected to carry the child to term.
Society is imposing this expectation upon the individual moral choice of each woman. It is an arrogation of responsibility from the individual to the collective. Accordingly, society also accepts the burden of the responsibility for the moral choice. Women who do not choose to become mothers at the delivery of their child may turn him or her over to the custody of society: private adoption, public adoption, charitable entities, state entities, in that order of priority. Women who do choose to become mothers, and fathers who do choose to become fathers, return to their homes with their children. Women who do not choose to become mothers, and fathers who do not choose to become fathers, return to their homes alone.
Childbirth imposes substantial economic costs on individual women. The benefits society derives from having childbirth are not a legitimate libertarian "public good" - they can be individually paid for and individually deprived, for one thing, which is an automatic failure to be a public good. However, they are definitely a good which we wish, as a society, to produce in relative abundance. This is not the place for a ZPG-vs-Heinleinian population explosion argument, so I will not address the point further, save to note that even ZPG generates a lot of births; there is a certainly minimum stream of customers that can be relied on. (NPG proponents may see themselves out quietly; ah, there they go.)
However, the case can still be made that some larger entity than the individual woman and man involved in a childbirth ought to be responsible for these economic costs. With rare exceptions, society wants people to have kids. (I think that in the case of those exceptions, we have to be harsh but fair: society won't pay for it, but if you must, go ahead and do it on your own hook.) Tax what you want less of, subsidize what you want more of; watch out for unforeseen but not unforeseeable consequences. (And be expecting to have to deal with the inevitable arrival of some of the latter.)
And with that in mind, as a society we want more childbearing. As conservatives, we want childbearing even more, as a better option than abortion.
The simplest solution, and the one involving the least potential abuse of government power, would be for the government to issue a voucher to every woman who becomes pregnant. The voucher would cover elementary prenatal care and consultation (but not genetic therapy, fertility, or selective processes), complete coverage for emergency care, and the cost of a basic hospital delivery. Women with their own health coverage or private means of covering these expenses would have the option of doing so, of course, and are free to augment the voucher with private spending. This benefit ought not to be means-tested; it should simply be universal, so that no woman need fear the consequences of normal pregancy would destroy her or her family financially.
We also need a means-tested stipend program for new mothers (or new fathers in the case where the father is the primary caregiver). Once you reach the seventh month of pregnancy, and if you have a child under the age of three, and are that child's primary caregiver, the state pays you a salary of, say, $20,000 per year (adjusted for local expense levels). Any two-parent family whose non-primary caregiver makes less than, say, twice the poverty line is eligible for the stipend. (Parents who split primary caregiver duties can split the stipend in any proportion they specify, subject to the same income limits for their combined outside income.)
For non-married couples, the same rules apply. However, mothers or fathers who do not perform primary caregiving duties are obliged to make the financial contribution that the government would normally make. Non-primary caregivers with lower incomes are assessed a portion of the levy and the state compensates for the difference. Marriage to the primary caregiver terminates this levy; marriage to someone else does not.
Stipends stop when the child turns three, as should the (already existing) young-child health coverage provided by most states. Additional children "reset the clock" but do not quality for any additional increment of benefits, other than the additional voucher(s) for pregnancy.
Women can end the stipend by putting their child up for adoption. Fathers have the right of first refusal if the mother does not wish to be a primary caregiver.
I apologize to my right-wing friends for the socialism; there doesn't seem to be any other way, fellows. I apologize to my left-wing friends for taking abortion away from them; you were kind of messing it up, anyway.
Opinions most receptively solicited.
