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<p>The value society places on children’s lives can be represented by the value of statistical life&#xa0;(VSL) from a dependency perspective. This measure represents the financial support individuals deem necessary for their dependents in the event of death. In this paper, we leverage the reduction in life insurance demand following abortion deregulation in order to provide a novel approach to estimating a component of this value: financial bequests to children. Exploiting the unique circumstances surrounding abortion deregulation in California, we use a synthetic control approach to evaluate life insurance holdings in California in the period immediately following deregulation of abortion in late 1969, four years before the U.S. Supreme Court decision in <i>Roe v. Wade (1973)</i>. We find that access to legal abortions led the average individual in California to hold approximately $1,979 (in 2023 dollars) less in life insurance when compared to other states with abortion restrictions in place, amounting to an annual average of $40.486 billion less in life insurance in force in the post-treatment years. With this information, as well as estimates of reductions in births, we estimate the average financial bequest to a child to be $2.058 million.</p>

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Financial bequests to children

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2025年10月24日

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  • Patricia H. Born,
  • J. Bradley Karl

摘要

The value society places on children’s lives can be represented by the value of statistical life (VSL) from a dependency perspective. This measure represents the financial support individuals deem necessary for their dependents in the event of death. In this paper, we leverage the reduction in life insurance demand following abortion deregulation in order to provide a novel approach to estimating a component of this value: financial bequests to children. Exploiting the unique circumstances surrounding abortion deregulation in California, we use a synthetic control approach to evaluate life insurance holdings in California in the period immediately following deregulation of abortion in late 1969, four years before the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade (1973). We find that access to legal abortions led the average individual in California to hold approximately $1,979 (in 2023 dollars) less in life insurance when compared to other states with abortion restrictions in place, amounting to an annual average of $40.486 billion less in life insurance in force in the post-treatment years. With this information, as well as estimates of reductions in births, we estimate the average financial bequest to a child to be $2.058 million.