ARNOLD KLING
August 14, 2011
The Top Political Contributors
August 11, 2011
Gender and the New Commanding Heights
August 11, 2011
Jamie Galbraith Makes an Assumption
August 11, 2011
Macroeconometrics: The Science of Hubris
August 10, 2011
Real and Nominal Bond Yields
BRYAN CAPLAN
August 14, 2011
The Effect of Thumb Sucking on Income
August 12, 2011
The Voice of Cold, Hard Truth to All Would-Be Educators
August 12, 2011
Ability, Morality, and Prosperity: A Paper and a Report
August 11, 2011
The Theory of Time and Frittering
August 10, 2011
Male Variance and the Remnants of the Gender Gap
DAVID HENDERSON
August 9, 2011
Hayek in "Unbroken", Part Two
August 8, 2011
Hayek in "Unbroken"
August 5, 2011
James Bovard on the Peace Corps
August 4, 2011
Summers Way Off on FDR and 1941
August 3, 2011
The "Amazon" Tax
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Poor Thoma! Just as he should be waking up refreshed from his long nap during the auto bailout, the drug companies have to go and spoil everything by inventing rent-seeking.
Has "rent seeking" become the economist's euphemism for Fascism?
Why would the drug companies trust that Obama will deliver his part of the agreement (think what has already happened with most of his promises)? Frankly, if indeed there is an agreement, there must be something else.
I'll never understand how this is a failure of democracy. Big Pharm has no power that dumb voters don't give it. Fixing anything but the leaky dumb voters is a poorly applied patch.
I think people love on democracy so hard, that they are forced to think of anyone who exploits it's failings as destroying democracy itself.
Interesting and written by Robert Reich, too!
I think this is great news. It could mean Obama's coalition is crumbling.
From what I understand of "Hillary Care" from Christopher Hitchens' No One Left To Lie To, coziness with big insurance providers was a factor in undermining "progressive" support for the plan.
A quote, from page 51 of that book, from Patrick Woodall of Public Citizen:
"The managed competition-style plan the Clintons have chosen virtually guarantees that the five largest health-insurance companies--Aetna, Prudential, Met Life, Cigna, and The Travelers--will run the show in the health-care system."
I don't think Hitchens is the keenest economic observer, but he was right to be alarmed by the ease with which the Clintons cozied up to Big Insurance. It's strangely satisfying to hear such concessions made by the Obama. Maybe the news will disabuse progressives of their belief in his purity and infallibility.