Bryce Covert is the economic policy editor at ThinkProgress and a contributor to The Nation. This op-ed appeared in The New York Times on April 25, 2017.

The Democrats' unity tour fractured into disunity almost immediately after it began. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont refused to say whether Jon Ossoff, the Democratic candidate trying to win a typically Republican district in Georgia while being outspoken in support of abortion rights, counts as a progressive. He then went on to stump for Heath Mello in Nebraska. Mr. Mello, who is running for mayor in Omaha, has sponsored legislation aimed at restricting women's access to abortion, including a bill in 2009 that required women to be informed that they could look at ultrasounds of their fetuses.

The Democratic National Committee chairman, Thomas E. Perez, didn't do much to dampen the growing outrage among progressives who see reproductive rights as core to their values. "If you demand fealty on every single issue, then it's a challenge," he said last week.

It's not just a misstatement from Mr. Perez or a slight from Mr. Sanders. Democrats, in their postelection soul searching, are trying to learn the lessons from Donald Trump's jolting victory and how they might win back the presidency. And some — all men so far, it should be noted — argue that the party should move away from so-called social issues like abortion and reproductive freedom.

Instead, these men contend, the party's focus must be on economics. The glaring mistake they all make, however, is thinking that there is any way to disentangle reproductive rights from economic issues.

Economics frequently drive women to seek an abortion in the first place. Unintended pregnancies have become increasingly concentrated among low-income women, who by 2011 were more than five times as likely to experience one as those with greater means. Among women getting an abortion, a 2004 survey found, the most frequently cited reasons were that a new child would interfere with education or work or that women couldn't afford to have a baby at that time. Abortion rates rose during the recent recession, particularly among low-income women, as they and their partners lost jobs and income.

And economics reverberates throughout women's lives when they can't get the abortions they need. In a study of women who sought an abortion, those who were unsuccessful were three times as likely to fall into poverty over the following two years as those women who were able to get one, despite beginning in comparable financial situations. They were also more likely to wind up unemployed.

Women who can get the abortions they seek, however, are more likely to follow through on their employment or educational plans.

A woman in a precarious financial situation who knows she can't afford a baby can easily fall farther behind if she has to raise a child, something that costs the average parent thousands of dollars a year. In a country that offers little to no paid leave, child care assistance or other supports, a new child can make it impossibly difficult to hold down a job or get a higher degree.

Democratic Party leaders have frequently tried to play down abortion to win elections. After Democrats failed to take the White House in 2004, Howard Dean, who would soon become chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said, "I have long believed that we ought to make a home for pro-life Democrats." This thinking among Democrats paved the way for debate on the Affordable Care Act to come to a screeching halt when Blue Dog Democrats like Bart Stupak wanted to insert anti-abortion provisions.

While this game plan could make a certain amount of electoral sense — according to Pew Research Center polling, about a third of independents believe abortion should be illegal in all or most cases, although a majority of the country believes it should be legal — it is galling coming from someone like Senator Sanders. He takes a hard line on vitally important economic issues yet refuses to see abortion as a strand of the same financial fabric. Mr. Sanders himself has a solid track record on supporting women's reproductive choices. But as he jockeys to lead a transformation of the Democratic Party's priorities and policies, it's not an issue he's committed to focusing on.

"You just can't exclude people who disagree with us on one issue," Mr. Sanders told NPR in defense of his decision to campaign with Mr. Mello. In 2015 he made it even clearer that he sees abortion as divorced from the economics he champions: "Once you get off of the social issues — abortion, gay rights, guns — and into the economic issues, there is a lot more agreement than the pundits understand."

Yet he would happily exclude from the progressive movement even those he formally supports, like Mr. Ossoff, who don't seem to talk enough about income inequality to satisfy Mr. Sanders.

It's true that abortion access, as well as contraception and other reproductive health needs, may not motivate the working-class voters who helped send Mr. Trump to the White House. But any woman who has had to decide whether she could afford to keep a baby will most likely be able to tell you that economics is deeply embedded in her choice. To pretend that these issues are different and that one can be abandoned for the other is disproved in countless women's lives.

Women fuel Democratic victories and are at the forefront of organizing against the Trump administration. Their votes and activism are more necessary than ever. It's both smart economics and smart politics to take a firm line on reproductive rights.

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April 26, 2017

Addendum. Something more to think about.