It may be time to change what they teach in political science 101 and in school civics classes. You see, an elementary distinction between the U.S. and most European democracies is that the other countries have a much more centralized government. Regional and local governments, such as they are, exist to carry out the rules of the capitol. It’s called a unitary system of government. […]
Health care
AGs lawsuit against ObamaCare
Last week, the Washington Policy Center held its eighth annual conference on health care. As part of the conference, Washington Attorney General Rob McKenna and KING-TV’s Allen Schauffler discussed the multi-state lawsuit challenging several provisions in the recent national health care reform legislation. You can view the discussion here, and it’s surprisingly interesting and informative. The entire video is about 45 minutes. The first 25 […]
How much will ObamaCare cost? Plenty
There are plenty of health-related reasons to oppose ObamaCare: It will lead to rationing by government, could stifle innovation in medical treatments, put the force of government behind cookbook medicine, and so forth. But did you know that it could also be very painful to the economy? Arthur Laffer says that it could cost each man, woman, and child in the U.S. $4,354, reduce economic […]
Government and your mouth
Almost every week I write something that is included in the update of the Minnesota Free Market Institute. Here’s my contribution for this week’s newsletter. (The formatting in the original is lost here.) In response to my last Weekly Update commentary, someone sent along a note, which said in part, that my “ignorance about American obesity is amazing. It has become a forgone conclusion that […]
Our Healthcare future: Affordability and access or regulation and rationing
In Minnesota as well as in Washington, DC, there’s a push for a government takeover of health care. People who value freedom are right to warn of the horrors of single-payer systems in Britain, Canada and elsewhere. But they should also offer a positive prescription for change. One prescription is the Cato Handbook for Policymakers, available at the Cato web site (www.cato.org). While the handbook […]
Who controls your health insurance?
Health care is the wedge issue for those who would insert more government control over the individual’s life. And why not, given public dissatisfaction with the status quo? But there’s a better way. From Sen. Norm Coleman’s junk mail one page “annual report” comes these encouraging words on health care policy. It’s a start. (I have introduced paragraph breaks to make the text more readable. Text […]
Minimum Wage Hike: Least of Worries to Small Business
Fortune Small Business says that a $1 an hour increase in the national minimum wage is in the works. Surprisingly, business groups don’t seem that upset at the idea. Why? They’re dealing with even greater increases in costs for employee health insurance premiums for several years running. The final paragraph of the story illustrates how political posturing undermines the alleged rationale for policy changes: Even proponents […]
TIME For Socialism
The February 2 issue of TIME hit a relative’s mailbox yesterday, where I picked it up while doing some housesitting. The cover story on the prescription drug controversy (motto: We want drugs, we want them cheap.) is an exercise in populism, economic ignorance, and socialism. To read the whole treatment online, you either have to be a subscriber, or read it through a library or […]
Do You Know How Much Your Health Insurance Premiums Are?
The Kaiser Family foundation has a new edition of their annual report on employer-sponsored health benefits. Here’s a link (PDF) to the summary. The survey finds that the average premium per employee for single coverage is $3,383 per year; for family coverage, it is $9,068. For single coverage, employees pay $508 a year (15 percent of the total), with employers paying $2,875 (85 percent). For family […]