There is a recent controversy in the United States regarding whether the Federal government can compel employers, including religious employers, to pay for contraception. Although this may not be objectionable to most religious Jews, who do not consider contraception to be equivalent to abortion, Catholics (who do consider it to be abortion) have objected to the new law rather vociferously.
What if some future policy would require employers to pay for actual abortions, by whatever definition would be considered as prohibited halachically?
How would a religious Jewish employer be required, by Jewish law, to respond to such a law? Is it permissible to subsidize someone else's transgression of such a grave prohibition? If such a law were to come into effect, would a Jewish school be required to either violate the law or shut down the school?
Answer
An employer is paying the premiums on an employee's insurance policy, which will then pay the medical expenses incurred by the employee committing a halachically-unacceptable act. With respect to "Lifnei Iver" or "placing a stumbling block before the blind," there are multiple mitigating factors:
- The prohibited act may never happen. The employee may never need to get an abortion.
- Even if the insurance policy didn't cover it, the employee may have paid for the abortion herself (see A"Z 6b re: "two sides of the river").
- If the employer wouldn't pay for the premiums, the employee can still obtain employment by another employer who will pay for it.
- It is "lifnei dLifnei," or it is causing one to stumble by causing another to stumble. This is not prohibited by Lifnei Iver (see A"Z 14a, and Tos. A"Z 15b).
With respect to "mesaya" or "facilitating sin", consider the payment of wages themselves. Say the employer knows that the employee will use the money for illicit acts. May the employer pay her wages? It doesn't seem logical that this should be considered "facilitating sin". It is too indirect.
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