Keith Hennessey reviews the disagreement between Paul Krugman (on one side) and Rep. Paul Ryan, New Gingrich, and John Goodman (on the other) about how to change Medicare so it does not bankrupt the country. How much is Medicare spending? Consider what Hennessey points out:
The policy reality is that if ...
Some choice words from Jeffrey S. Flier, Dean of Harvard's Medical School. Some excerpts from his Wall Street Journal article:
Our health-care system suffers from problems of cost, access and quality, and needs major reform. Tax policy drives employment-based insurance; this begets overinsurance and drives costs upward while creating inequities for ...
From the Wall Street Journal:
...the bills are fiscally dishonest, using every budget gimmick and trick in the book: Leave out inconvenient spending, back-load spending to disguise the true scale, front-load tax revenues, let inflation push up tax revenues, promise spending cuts to doctors and hospitals that have no record of ...
Harry Reid's Senate health bill up for a procedural vote on Saturday, which could allow it to move forward to debate. (Yet Republicans are pushing to read the whole thing, which could take 34 hours!) In any case, be wary of how this bill will cut the deficit: remember how ...
The Wall Street Journal has a good summary of how government programs always exceed their spending estimates. Here's a chart:
The article concludes:
The lesson here is that spending on nearly all federal benefit programs grows relentlessly once they are established. This history won't stop Democrats bent on ramming their entitlement into ...
This video by Reason.tv reminds us that politicians are terrible at predicting costs of their programs.
Related video: Obama Care and America’s Entitlement Kids.
Unfunded liabilities from Medicare and Social Security cost each U.S. household the cost of raising two children. ObamaCare adds one-third of a "government kid."
(Via Paul Gessing at StateHouseCall.)
