ABSTRACT
The massive migration from rural areas to the city, from small towns to large urban centers, the shift from agriculture and self-employment to wage labor, and the emergence of modern technological post-industrial society that set the twentieth century apart from the nineteenth created a new set of ground rules for workers and their families. This chapter focuses on these new risks and the ethical decisions they require of families. Many middle-class families face the very real risk of downward mobility as the result of the increasing inequality that has accompanied neoliberal market-based economic policies. Many women find to their dismay that fertility postponed becomes fertility foregone. Both fertility drugs and multiple implantation of fertilized eggs in In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) increase the probability of multiple births. The reality of the new reproductive technology means that legislatures will be forced to deal with these issues. The chapter also summarizes surrogacy laws and illustrates how they vary from state to state.
