The nights of rage commenced almost as soon as the US Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade and returned the abortion question to the states. In New York, protesters gathered before St. Patrick’s Cathedral—repeatedly. In Arizona, they assailed the state Senate building, pounding on and damaging its doors.
Yet clarity emerged amid the acrid clouds of tear gas launched by police trying to disperse the protesters: For the only thing that erupted faster than the street gatherings were pledges by big businesses—from JPMorgan Chase to Dick’s Sporting Goods, Goldman Sachs to Disney—to facilitate and subsidize abortions for employees and their dependents, travel included.
Why are America’s largest firms so dedicated to maximizing abortion access? The answer is obvious, if misanthropic: Family commitments are an inconvenience to corporations, because they impede bigger bottom lines; motherhood, especially, is an obstacle to productivity. In other words, modern feminism and managerial capitalism march hand-in-hand against the family.
“No group has done more in our time to encourage abortion than … the managers of US capitalism.”