Business Impacts
Where You Do Business Matters: Restrictions and bans on reproductive health care affects employers’ costs, talent recruitment and retention, and employee well-being.
The Business Case for Abortion Access
By a margin of 2:1, workers prefer to live in a state where abortion is accessible. This number is even higher for women, young adults, and college students.
76% of current and future doctors would not apply to work in states with abortion restrictions. This shift will impact workforce access to quality healthcare in general.
15% of patients must travel out of state for abortion care. Bans create costs and liabilities for employers that support their employees’ access to care.
The Problem
Abortion is now illegal in 13 states, with barriers to care in additional states.
In the year following the Dobbs decision, 26.1 million women of reproductive age were living in a state that eliminated or severely restricted abortion access – a form of healthcare that one in four women may need over the course of their careers.
What Workers Want
Majorities of men and women in the U.S. support the right to abortion.
66% of adults under 30 and 61% of adults in their 30s and 40s believe abortion should be legal.
Workers would prefer to live in a state where abortion is accessible, and this is especially true for younger adults.
Driving away talent
Bans hurt a company’s talent pipeline in states
Abortion bans cause significant increases in net migration outflows from states. 2025 data indicates that total abortion bans come at the cost of more than 36,000 residents per quarter.
As of January 2025, one in five individuals planning to have children within the next decade has moved–or knows someone who has moved–to another state due to abortion restrictions.
Abortion bans can dry up future talent pipelines, too: 80% of current and prospective college students prefer to attend school in states with greater access to reproductive care, and 84% of students and 69% of parents do not want students to be without abortion access at college.
Worsening healthcare for the whole workforce
Bans and restrictions on reproductive healthcare have created significant healthcare and well-being risks for workers. State bans and restrictions are also diminishing access to healthcare for the entire workforce in states.
Nearly 60% of parents and people planning to have children in the next decade are concerned about access to abortion, OB-GYN services, and prenatal care.
State abortion restrictions are also tied to a drop in the OB-GYN workforce. 76% of current and future doctors across a number of practice areas would not apply to work in states with abortion restrictions. Fewer new medical school graduates across specialties, are applying to residency programs in states with abortion bans or restrictions. This reduced influx of doctors to anti-abortion states will impact access to and quality of healthcare for the entire workforce there.
68% of Americans oppose laws that make it illegal to receive FDA-approved drugs for medical abortion through the mail, including a majority of Americans across party affiliation.
Miscarriage care and abortion care rely on the same medicines and medical procedures, and there have been reports in numerous states of women suffering serious health complications because they were denied miscarriage care due to abortion bans.
Mothers living in states that banned abortion are nearly twice as likely to die during and soon after pregnancy and childbirth
68% of OB/GYNs say that abortion bans have worsened their ability to manage pregnancy-related emergencies, putting pregnant workers and their families in jeopardy.
People want to work for companies that support abortion rights.
Young people who want families are fleeing ban states and choosing employers that prioritize reproductive healthcare benefits.
76% of working women and 74% of working men under 40 say that they are more likely to work for a company that supports abortion access.
The Price of Safety: Stories of Abortions Denied, Careers Disrupted, and States Left Behind
For many Americans, reproductive healthcare policy is a factor that influences where they choose to live, work, and start families. Those decisions ripple outward, reshaping medical systems, labor markets, and the long-term economic health of entire states.
This anthology puts faces to the numbers through the experiences of patients, physicians, business leaders, and families. The stories illustrate how brain drain is unfolding, and how access to comprehensive reproductive health care supports stable families, strong workforces, and sustainable economic growth.
Complicating business operations, costs, and liabilities
State abortion bans and restrictions are creating new costs, liabilities, and operational concerns for employers.
In 2024, 155,000 people traveled out of state for abortion care, representing 15% of all US abortion patients obtaining care in states without total bans.
In 2025, more than 140,000 people traveled outside of their state for for abortion care.
Some state legislators have criminalized travel and attempted to punish employers that help their workers access care.
State abortion bans are creating new costs for employers, as well as “murky” legal implications around coverage of workers’ travel costs to obtain an abortion.
Anti-abortion activists often also support “fetal personhood” laws as part of restricting or banning reproductive healthcare, creating potential liability and costs for employers when their support of IVF for employees clashes with such laws.
Hidden Value:
The Business Case For Reproductive Health
The Business Case for Reproductive Health illuminates the link between access to comprehensive reproductive health care and business performance.
There is a correlation between abortion restrictions and economic underperformance, from lower GDP to decline in employment to below-average wages. Abortion bans and restrictions not only jeopardize reproductive health but have a range of impacts that can harm state economies.