Chronic Murmuring

Strange, somewhat discomforting recommendations for markets for babies and organs

Provactive little blog over at Marginal Revolutions. Tyler Cowen notes that the FDA has passed a device that will extend the time a person can live while waiting for a heart transplant. I didn't link through to the story, because I'm lazy, but it sounds like a temporary heart to assist a diseased or failed heart, thus allowing the person to live for a longer period of time while they wait for an actual transplant. Cowen notes the gray lining beneath this wonderful news and notes that the artificial heart will do nothing to increase the number of lives are saved. "But even if the artificial heart performs exactly as designed and even if it prolongs the lives of those who receive it, it won't save lives overall." Why? Because at present 2200 hearts are available for donation, and this device does nothing to increase that number. His solution, which is something some will immediately scoff at, is to consider allowing markets for organs to develop.

I was thinking the same thing other day, only in regards to babies. Who is it that aborts their children? It's mothers who do not want their babies. If markets for babies existed, then these mothers - who we know do not want their babies - could be compensated if they sold their babies to people who wanted them. It may not completely remove the market for adoptions, though, since it would require the mother to carry the baby to term, and from what I can gather, many women who abort are afraid of carrying the baby to term for fear that they will actually love their child, and not want to give them up then. So they make a decision to eliminate the child in a previous period when there do not yet exist attachments to the child. Some mothers will likely still want to abort, insofar as they are motivated to abort the child because of the nine-month term and because of the fear of attachments. But, for those who are motivated to abort because they cannot afford the baby, or regret the pregnancy, or are signal, or whatever - a market for babies would actually decrease the number of babies being aborted.

Of course, it would probably also lead to an increase in illegitimacy rates. You might imagine small farms for babies arising where a man would impregnate his mistress or wife serially. Now this is entirely possible. But the babies would still be moving to people who value them most of all - potentially parents who love them more than those original parents. Of course, there's something inherently discomforting, if not downright disgusting, about this scenario. But there's a very real baby shortage out there. Some estimates are as high as one million - one million couples at any given period of time are searching and waiting for a child to adopt but cannot.

So insofar as it's important to deal with that, it's worth at least considering how markets might be developed to deal with both of these problems - shortages in organs and babies. There is an excessively high number of babies destroyed each year because they are not wanted by parents, and simultaneously, there is a high number of parents searching for children.