Welfare causes teen pregnancy...

A few weeks ago I had a patient in the ED for something "urgent" and while there she got to the real point of her visit and asked for a pregnancy test. (Yes, this happens frequently.  There is an entire subset of humans who, rather than run to the pharmacy, wait until the middle of the night and come to the ED.  Saves their $5, you see.)

Anyway, she was pregnant and the first thing out of her mouth was, "Now I can quit my job."

About a week later I had dinner with a friend who manages a factory.  During dinner he was griping about how hard it was to get and keep employees (yes, even in this economy.)  He said he'd just had two late teens/early 20's women quit.  When they resigned he asked why and they both said, "I'm pregnant."

He responded, "But you have insurance."

And they both said, "Yeah, but now we can get welfare."

Then this morning I was reading an article on Slate about teen moms and poverty and amongst all the psychobabble about despair leading to teen pregnancy I saw this:

  (Although stingier welfare benefits do appear to cut birthrates a bit.)

One parenthetical line that was just tossed out, then ignored.  Perhaps that line deserves more investigation.