Sorry about the recent silence; I’ve been trying to kill off a rewrite of a paper, and sometimes I find that to get things done you just have to be singleminded about your priorities.
In case you haven’t seen them yet, I wanted to point out a couple of things that have been making the rounds of the Internet:
- Most of the people writing about health care reform on economics blogs – present company included – are not health care economics specialists. Uwe Reinhardt is. So when he writes about “rationing health care,” I recommend reading (hat tip Mark Thoma).
- Brad Setser is branching out from foreign reserves, holdings of U.S. government and agency bonds, and China – on which he is probably the leading figure on the Internet – to, well, everything. Visit the Council on Foreign Relations’ “Crisis Guide: The Global Economy” and click on Motion Charts. There are four charts in the sidebar to the right. For each one, you can watch Setser on video, or you can click the “Interact with Motion Chart” link and play with it yourself.
Happy reading.
By James Kwak
The Baseline Scenario 
Hey James, “baseline” isn’t “baseline” without James Kwak. Since you’re studying at Yale, one of the best Universities in the world, which undoubtedly takes a lot of effort and “burning the midnight oil” we’ve decided to forgive you (haha). Just don’t let the Yale neocon brainwashing breakthrough to the better recesses of your mind, OK???
Mr. Kwak recommends reading Uwe Reinhardt to learn more about healthcare, which is excellent advice.
One of the voters in Iowa asked Republican Senator Chuck Grassley why his healthcare coverage wasn’t as good as Senator Grassley’s healthcare coverage. The Republican Senator’s advice: “YOU CAN!!! GO WORK FOR THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT”. So, if you want GOOD healthcare coverage folks, Senator Grassley recommends you get a government job. I guess Grassley should know. You can watch Republican Senator Grassley’s answer on this link.
Matt Taibbi and Tyler Durden are opening a lot of questions about Goldman Sachs & their effect on the economy, past, current & future. Wondering about your views?
http://rawstory.com/08/news/2009/07/04/taibbi-nyse-ends-transparency-to-protect-goldman-sachs/
Uwe Reinhardt brings together a superb synthesis of examples rebutting the mostly ideological, but often cynical, inconsistency of the health care “free marketeers.” They ignore the current method of rationing and deplore a new (fairer) method. Among many things, we have middle class taxpaying families, uninsured or underinsured, taxed to pay for Medicare and Medicaid for others (some on Medicare fairly wealthy), and those very families’ health care is rationed by price and wealth right now.
The rationing of health care could be a “red herring” deflecting debate from how much ration of the GDP do private health insurers get to keep and even grow.
It’s a pity that people need to be reminded that PRICES ARE A RATIONING SYSTEM, but I’m glad someone’s doing just that. Thanks for pointing this up.