Synopsis

This project will examine the effects of legalizing access to abortion services on women ’ s outcomes relating to family formation, human capital formation, labour market participation and health. An honours thesis will cover family formation, while longer-term research will explore the latter three outcome areas. The treatment, legalised access to abortion, is defined as the combination of individual Australian state legislative abortion reforms and the inclusion of abortion medication on the Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme. The project will utilise a staggered differences-in-differences methodology to isolate the effects of legalized access and allow for comparisons between each state in Australia across different time periods.