Read Steve Benen on the madness of privatizing the VA health care system and the tea-fueled candidates who want to do it. Then come back over here for some neoliberal claptrap.
Right. So there’s a lack of precision in the discourse around “privatization” of this or that that always bugs me. The classic case of privatization has to do with state-owned firms, which we largely never had in the United States. But many European countries had things like a state-owned airline or a state-owned phone company. In this case, “privatization” means you sell the firm. And then the state of play post-privatization is just that you have a private firm selling airplane tickets or telephone lines or whatever.
Oftentimes, though, we’re talking about something pretty different. You sometimes hear that Denmark has privatized its fire fighting services. But that doesn’t mean that Denmark just sold all the fire stations and has left it up to the free market whether or not fires are extinguished. On the contrary, Danish municipalities provide firefighting services to their residents. But instead of taking revenue and using it to hire firemen and buy fire trucks, they use the revenue to contract with a firm—Falck A/S is the largest—to provide firefighting services. Then the firm hires firemen and trucks and so forth.
If you’re standing in England and proposing that the health care system be turned into something like Medicare, I think people would say that you’re proposing “privatization” of health care. Instead of doctors and nurses working for the National Health Service they’ll work for private firms and the government will contract with them to provide health care. But if you’re standing in the United States and proposing that people under the age of 65 receive Medicare, then people would say that you’re proposing “socialized medicine.” What’s happening, of course, is that Medicare represents socialized financing of health care and private provision—just like Danish firefighting.
The downsizing of Japan’s ambitions can be seen on the streets of Tokyo, where concrete “microhouses” have become popular among younger Japanese who cannot afford even the famously cramped housing of their parents, or lack the job security to take out a traditional multidecade loan.
These matchbox-size homes stand on plots of land barely large enough to park a sport utility vehicle, yet have three stories of closet-size bedrooms, suitcase-size closets and a tiny kitchen that properly belongs on a submarine….
But in Japan, nearly a generation of deflation has had a much deeper effect, subconsciously coloring how the Japanese view the world. It has bred a deep pessimism about the future and a fear of taking risks that make people instinctively reluctant to spend or invest, driving down demand “” and prices “” even further.”
A new common sense appears, in which consumers see it as irrational or even foolish to buy or borrow,” said Kazuhisa Takemura, a professor at Waseda University in Tokyo who has studied the psychology of deflation.
The NY Times has a fascinating front-page story, “Japan Goes From Dynamic to Disheartened.” It explains how, for many Japanese, “living standards slowly crumbled along with Japan’s overall economy,” thanks in large part to two decades of failed economic policies.
Voters in this country who seem poised to put the people who got us in our current economic mess back in charge, at least of the US House of Representatives, may think grid-lock is good, yet I’m sure they also believe such a future is impossible for this country.
The NYT‘s explanation for why it can’t happen here isn’t reassuring:
Gillian Tett on campaign finance is interesting throughout. This is a provocative paragraph:
But more noteworthy than the numbers is the increasingly fierce emotion – and cognitive dissonance – that the issue of campaign finance stirs up. In theory, America is a country that prides itself on the idea that Congress serves “the people”, not just the rich. Thus there is moral outrage over the concept of “buying the vote”, and laws exist to prevent that: individual donations are capped; most donations need to be disclosed; and (until recently) companies could not give directly to politicians.
However, precisely because these detailed laws exist – and because campaigning is a very costly business, subject to a permanent type of inflation-cum-arms race – in recent decades America has developed myriad practices to enable that cash to flow indirectly. The result is a dense shadowy network of middlemen, rent-seekers and ambiguous institutions that are complex and inefficient; if not, downright odd.
One wonders what might happen if straightforward bribery—the depositing of funds directly into a candidate’s personal bank account—were legal. Less rent-seeking, more efficiency. Candidates could choose to “self-finance” their campaigns out of the bribe pool, or else they might just go out and buy a fancy car. Forcing the principals to make these kind of tradeoffs internally might shed some light on how much money really “matters” in campaigns. Enhanced opportunities for personal enrichment via legislative office might attract a different caliber of people into the game—more greed and less egomania and lust for power.
Just a thought.
Alternatively, we could publicly finance campaigns like in a real country and enhance congress’ ability to access legitimate staff expertise and analytical capacity rather than relying on lobbyists and trade groups to do the work.
Touting her outisde, business-executive saavy, GOP Senate candidate Carly Fiorina (R-CA) constantly chants the GOP mantra to cut government spending. She even released a budget plan last month intended to prove that she’d “rein in out-of-control government spending.” But, in telling her constituents that she will cut government spending, Fiorina seems undaunted by one minor fact: she has no idea how.
Today on Fox News Sunday, host Chris Wallace gave Fiorina a chance to lay out her actual plan. Touting her “tough, bottom-line business executive” motto, Wallace pointed out that Fiorina also wants “to extend all, all the Bush tax cuts which would add $4 trillion dollars to the deficit…where are you going to find $4 trillion dollars to cut?” But when Fiorina retreated to recycled response of government waste and an earmarks ban, a frustrated Wallace begged Fiorina seven times to “name one single entitlement expenditure you’re willing to cut” because “that’s where the money is.” Fiorina’s only response? “You’re asking a typical political question”:
WALLACE: You’re campaigning and you just alluded to it, to your record as a tough, bottom line, former business executive. But you want to extend all the Bush tax cuts which would add 4 trillion to the deficit. You say balance the budget by cutting spending. Question, as a bottom line businesswoman, where are you going to find $4 trillion to cut?
FIORINA: …We don’t know how taxpayer money is spent in Washington, D.C, which is why I think we ought to put every agency budget up on the internet for everyone to see, ban earmarks, and we ought to give citizens the opportunity to desginate up to 10% of their federal income tax toward debt reduction. If we did, that we would reduce our debt by $95 billion a year.
WALLACE: Miss Fiorina, the traditional ways that people talk about non-discretionary – I mean discretionary, non-defense spending is only 16% of the budget. You could cut all of that out, all for education and energy, and for police support and government worker support around the country, it wouldn’t be anywhere close to $4 trillion. Where are you going to get that kind of money if you extend all of the bust era tax cuts. That only adds to the deficit. It doesn’t even deal with the deficit we already have.
FIORINA: Well, of course, first the thing we need to do, to deal with our debt and our deficit is to both cut spending and grow the economy. That’s fundamentally what we have to do. Those tax cuts are central to growing the economy. Indeed, I would argue there are some additional tax cuts we need to make.[...]
WALLACE: Miss Fiorina, let me ask you a specific question because I still haven’t gotten many specifics on how you will cut $4 trillion and more out of the budget. Back when there was talk about a non-partisan, or a bipartisan deficit, debt commission you blasted that idea in January and said we know all the solutions. We don’t need another commission to study it. Now…you tell me specifically what are you going to do to cut the billions, the trillions of dollars in entitlements?
FIORINA: First, I didn’t blast the commission saying we already had solutions. I blasted the commission because I believed it was a feint for tax increases.[...]
WALLACE: But forgive me, Miss Fiorina, where are you going to cut entitlements? What benefits are you going to cut? What eligibility are you doing..
FIORINA: Chris, I have to say, with all due respect, you’re asking a typical political question.[...]
WALLACE: It may be a typical political question but that’s where the money is. The money is in Medicare and Social Security. We have baby-boomers coming. There will be a huge explosion of entitlement explosion and you call it a political question when I ask you to name one single entitlement you are willing to cut.
FIORINA: Chris, I believe to deal with entitlement reform, which we must deal with, we ought to put every possible solution on the table, except we should be very clear we are not going to cut benefits to those nearing retirement or those nearing retirement or those in retirement.[...]
WALLACE: I’m going to try one last time, and if you don’t want to answer it, Miss Fiorina, you don’t have to.
FIORINA: It’s not a question of not wanting to answer it!
WALLACE: Let me ask the question, if I may, please. You’re not willing to put forward a single benefit – I’m not talking about the people 60 or let alone 65, or 70. I’m talking about people under 55. You’re not willing to say there is a single benefit eligibility for Medicare, Medicaid, or Social Security that you are willing to say “Yeah, I would cut that?”
FIORINA: What I think we need to do to engage the American people in a conversation about entitlement reform is to have a bipartisan group of people who come together and put every solution on the table, every alternative on the table. Then we ought to engage in a long conversation with the American people so they understand the choices.
Watch it:
Wallace’s exasperation is understandable. For all of Fiorina’s bluster about government spending, her solutions don’t add up to any serious impact. An earmark ban would only account for less than one percent of the federal budget and eliminating ineffective or duplicative programs would not come close to addressing the deficit. As the Wonk Room’s Pat Garofalo points out, she’d have to eliminate the entire discretionary budget — which includes defense spending defense spending, all federal education funding, some veteran’s benefits, the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Secret Service, federal highway funding, and Congress itself — to eliminate the deficit. In fact, the only “solution” Fiorina has offered is to defund the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau — an agency that does not yet exist.
While frustrating, Fiorina’s lack of solutions should not be surprising. As a member of the GOP, Fiorina joins a slew of Republicans in their refusal to offer any deficit solutions no matter how many times a reporter may beg:
Coverage of the standing desk revolution in The Washington Post (via Tyler Cowen). I usually sit for about 1-2 hours in the workday, plus whatever comes up in meetings, and stand for the rest. It’s pretty great. Back feels better, legs get stronger quickly, you burn somewhat more calories, and research (as detailed in the piece) seems to point toward some other benefits.
But I don’t want people to be too put off by sentences like “GeekDesk, a California company that sells $800 desks raised by electric motors, says sales will triple this year.” I’m sure GeekDesk’s $800 electric motor desks are lovely, and maybe some day in the future I’ll have the pleasure of trying one. But I started standing with a laptop perched on a stack of books, and am now using something that looks like a music stand or a little lectern.
Point being: If you want to stand up, I’m sure you can find a way. One good place to start is that many people (though not me) talk on the phone a fair amount at work. You should be able to do your phone calls while standing without any kind of special equipment and then see how you feel about it.
Appearing on CNN this morning, Candy Crowley challenged Gary Bauer, a board member of the neoconservative Emergency Committee for Israel (ECI), to reveal the names of the donors funding ECI’s attack ads in Pennsylvania against Democrat senate candidate Joe Sestak. Bauer refused (“of course not!”), and then explained that his pro-Israel donors might face harassment if their names were known:
CROWLEY: Let me turn to you the money question. You are co- chair of one group that is putting ads on the air usually concerning people’s — candidates’ support for or against Israel…
BAUER: Yes.
CROWLEY: … and do not disclose the donors. Would you do that? Would you give me the name of the donors?
BAUER: No, of course not! [...] The reason this disclosure issue is so important, Candy, quite frankly, is that, on the left in this country, there has been in recent years campaigns of intimidation and outright thuggery when people have put their names on the line and promoted conservative ideas.
CROWLEY: So you’re saying that the main reason that you wouldn’t tell me the donors who are putting these ads up trying to influence the outcome of an election — you’re telling me that they are afraid that they’ll be harassed if people know they are pro-Israel?
BAUER: I think one — well, I think one of the factors is that some of these folks are Democrats, and they don’t want to alienate Democratic friends and people that they work with.
CROWLEY: But isn’t that what democracy is all about?
Watch it:
One of the main claims of ECI — which belatedly came out in support of a two-state solution last month after being shamed into it by the pro-Israel, pro-peace group J Street — is that Americans overwhelmingly agree with them on issues relating to Israel. Yet now one of their board members suggests that ECI cannot reveal the names of donors for fear that they would be harassed. That doesn’t really indicate much confidence in their claims, or in democracy itself.
I had a little exchange on Twitter yesterday about “monetary policy skeptics” that make me think it’s useful to draw some distinctions.
In particular, I think going forward there’s a need for more clarity between people who are “skeptical” in the sense of “skeptical that monetary policymakers will in fact do what’s necessary” (this is the view of Atrios, Goldman Sachs’ Jan Hatzius, etc.) and “skeptical” in the sense of “skeptical that monetary measures can be made to work” which I believe is the view of Mark Thoma and Dean Baker and others. This is important, among other things, because a lack of clarity on these points sometimes confuses people about what happened in Japan.
I heard from some readers, for example, that the Bank of Japan spent a lot of time trying to create inflation and failed. That’s not really what happened. Instead, the Bank of Japan spent a fair amount of time trying to fight deflation and had limited but real success. They always indicated, however, that they wanted “price stability” not inflation and certainly not catchup level targeting of anything. This kind of stop/start policymaking does exactly what it’s supposed to do—it prevents collapse without being unduly unorthodox—but it can’t really lift the price level or the economy. But that’s not to say policymakers don’t have the ability to say that unorthodox measures will remain in place until full employment resumes. Thus far, in both Japan and the US, they’ve simply chosen not to do so.
Plus his must-see interview by Glenn Beck who says, “I think there are too many stupid people”
Okay, this post is mostly my chance to blog about William Shatner, the iconic figure of 1960s science fiction techno-optimism, who has shown that one can build a career around almost absurdist self-parody (much like Glenn Beck).
This morning, during a Colorado Senate debate hosted by Meet The Press, Republican candidate Ken Buck said that being gay is a choice and compared it to alcoholism:
GREGORY: In a debate last month, you expressed your support for don’t ask, don’t tell, which we talked about with Mr. Gibbs. And you alluded to lifestyle choices. Do you believe that being gay is a choice?
BUCK: I do.
GREGORY: Based on what?
BUCK: Based on what?
GREGORY: Yeah, do you believe that?
BUCK: Well, I guess you can choose who your partner is.
GREGORY: You don’t think it’s something that’s determined at birth?
BUCK: I think that birth has an influence over it, like alcoholism and some other things, but I think that basically you have a choice.
Watch it:
During the earlier debate in September, Buck said he did not support repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell because “we have to make sure that we are as homogeneous as possible in the military.” He claimed that ending the ban would create “distractions that are caused by allowing lifestyle choices to become part of the discussion.”
Huffington Post’s Amanda Terkel points out, according to all major mainstream medical and mental health professional organizations, “sexual orientation is not a choice.” As the American Psychological Association has concluded, “[M]ost people experience little or no sense of choice about their sexual orientation.”
This morning, during a Colorado Senate debate hosted by Meet The Press, Republican candidate Ken Buck said that being gay is a choice and compared it to alcoholism:
GREGORY: In a debate last month, you expressed your support for don’t ask, don’t tell, which we talked about with Mr. Gibbs. And you alluded to lifestyle choices. Do you that believe being gay is a choice?
BUCK: I do.
GREGORY: Based on what?
BUCK: Based on what?
GREGORY: Yeah, do you believe that?
BUCK: Well, I guess you can choose who your partner is.
GREGORY: You don’t think it’s something that’s determined at birth?
BUCK: I think that birth has an influence over it, like alcoholism and some other things, but I think that basically you have a choice.
Watch it:
During the earlier debate in September, Buck said he did not support repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell because “we have to make sure that we are as homogeneous as possible in the military.” He claimed that ending the ban would create “distractions that are caused by allowing lifestyle choices to become part of the discussion.”
Huffington Post’s Amanda Terkel points out, according to all major mainstream medical and mental health professional organizations, “sexual orientation is not a choice. As the American Psychological Association has concluded, “[M]ost people experience little or no sense of choice about their sexual orientation.”
