MedWorm provides a medical RSS filtering service. Over 6000 RSS medical sources are combined and output via different filters. This feed contains the latest medical blog items that have been tagged with 'budget'. Sat, 03 Sep 2011 01:51:32 +0100 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5181755&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FCI2yeRoDrWo%2F By Adam SchaefferUSA Today reports that part of President Obama’s much-anticipated plan for the economy, 3.0, might involve sending billions more in construction funding to our government school system: A plan to boost construction jobs nationwide by providing federal money to repair public schools is picking up support among unions, economists and liberal advocates with direct ties to the White House. Brilliant! Just the thing to fix our education system, economy and massive deficit . . . more lavish spending piled up high upon our already-lavishly-funded government schools. Andrew Coulson already reviewed the dismal record of our total K-12 education “investment” over the last few decades. The short story; the cost per student has nearly tripled while test scores at the end of high... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5181755 Thu, 01 Sep 2011 21:18:18 +0100 5181755 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5181759&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F30qWJ0GB2HI%2F By Daniel J. MitchellI’ve written extensively about the flaws of Keynesian economics, and I’ve even narrated a video on the flaws of Keynesian theory. But this clever cartoon may be more effective than anything I’ve ever done. If you like cartoons that teach economics, check out this gem. It’s not on Keynesianism, but it’s very good. Keynesian Economics in a Cartoon is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5181759 Thu, 01 Sep 2011 16:21:21 +0100 5181759 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5181761&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FeASxPkf0FLg%2F By Chris EdwardsPresident Obama is planning to deliver a big speech on jobs and the economy. His wish list for Congress will likely include more government infrastructure spending. (Infrastructure spending is also on Rachel Maddow’s wish list). So that citizens know what the president is talking about, they should review the success of the government’s past infrastructure projects. Here’s one to consider: It’s the Yuma Desalting Plant in Arizona, built by the federal Bureau of Reclamation at a taxpayer cost of $245 million. After completing the plant in 1993, Uncle Sam said: “Whoops, we don’t need it after all.” The plant has sat idle for almost two decades, and taxpayers are getting hit for $6 million a year to maintain it. It gets worse. The purpose of the Yuma plant is to... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5181761 Wed, 31 Aug 2011 19:30:32 +0100 5181761 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5181768&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F0FaWo2NWsUM%2F By Sallie JamesLast week I blogged about Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s (D-CA) proposal to devote $20 billion of the Export-Import Bank’s funds to promoting manufacturing exports, and why that was a bad idea. But I realize that my recent call to “X Out the Ex-Im Bank” will be facing some very entrenched interests in Washington, and some well-funded lobby groups. The Bank has historically attracted bipartisan support, and a renewal of its charter sailed through the House Committee on Financial Services earlier this year. The Washington establishment loves this program. My friend and long-time Ex-Im Bank supporter Gary Hufbauer of the Peterson Institute for International Economics published a critique a few weeks ago of my analysis, and calls for a doubling of Ex-Im’s authorization cap (f... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5181768 Tue, 30 Aug 2011 22:03:53 +0100 5181768 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5181770&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F68GqLjEXQe4%2F By Chris EdwardsIf you looked at the new CBO report on the budget, you may have noticed that federal spending this year will be $3.6 trillion. In fact, federal spending this year will top $4 trillion. But virtually all reporters and budget wonks (including me) routinely use the lower number when discussing total federal spending. I don’t think the higher $4 trillion number even appears anywhere in the CBO report. The $3.6 trillion figure is “net” outlays. But “gross” outlays, or total spending, is quite a bit higher. The difference is caused by “offsetting collections” and “offsetting receipts.” These are revenue inflows to the government that are netted against spending at the program level, agency level, or government-wide level. Some examples are national park fees, Me... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5181770 Tue, 30 Aug 2011 20:25:36 +0100 5181770 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5174597&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FFiy1IQMguDM%2F By Daniel J. MitchellThe White House has announced that it is nominating Alan Krueger, a professor at Princeton, to be the new Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. In a Freudian copy-editing slip, the Fox News story (at least as of 8:44 a.m.) says “Krueger’s job will be to provide policy prescriptions on ways to spur unemployment.” That’s obviously tailor-made for a joke about the Obama Administration not needing any help when it comes to stimulating joblessness. On a more serious note, though, I’m worried about Krueger’s sympathy for a value-added tax (VAT). Here’s what he wrote back in 2009. …a 5 percent consumption tax would raise approximately $500 billion a year, and fill a considerable hole in the budget outlook. In addition, a... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5174597 Mon, 29 Aug 2011 14:00:06 +0100 5174597 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5169545&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=39187&url=http%3A%2F%2Fgetbetterhealth.com%2Fdo-physicians-have-a-role-in-controlling-healthcare-costs%2F2011.08.27 The Role of Physicians in Controlling Medical Care Costs and Reducing Waste by the RAND Corporation and David Geffen, University of California Los Angeles School of Medicine, Santa Monica was just published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).  I do not think the JAMA should have published this article. 1.Why would the JAMA publish such an article? 2. Why are physicians blamed for all the waste in the system? 3. Why is it the physicians’ responsibility to eliminate waste when they are not the cause of the greatest percentage of the waste? “The amount of money spent on medical care is increasing faster than the gross domestic product (GDP), and the federal deficit is increasing.” The initial statement assumes that the government deficit is increasing because phy... Better Health blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5169545 Sat, 27 Aug 2011 21:05:19 +0100 5169545 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5169522&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F69TROv4uD_w%2F By Sallie JamesCongressional Quarterly reported on Monday [subscription required] that Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D, Calif.) has called for $20 billion worth of increased lending to U.S. manufacturers through a new targeted program of the Export-Import Bank of the United States (“the Ex-Im Bank”). Sen. Dianne Feinstein called Monday for a new initiative to promote lending to U.S. manufacturers in an effort to spur job creation and shrink the U.S. trade deficit. The California Democrat proposed authorizing the U.S. Export-Import Bank to use $20 billion of unobligated authority to lend directly to domestic manufacturing companies that are competing with foreign competitors subsidized by their own governments… Feinstein said her proposal would not be costly because of the offsetting collect... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5169522 Fri, 26 Aug 2011 22:13:09 +0100 5169522 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5169524&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FeDWnr-NPbEE%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: Small Business Administration supporters have cultivated a myth that being against the agency is equivalent to being against small businesses. In reality, the great majority of American small businesses have thrived without government subsidies. Chris Edwards looks at the spending record of Texas governor Rick Perry. Too often local reporters treat the receipt of federal funds as a free lunch to be celebrated. However, like all federal subsidies, HUD’s Community Development Block Grant program does not create economic activity — it merely redirects it according to political and bureaucratic whims. A budget plan promises to cut federal spending by 25 percent per year and ha... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5169524 Fri, 26 Aug 2011 18:53:49 +0100 5169524 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5169527&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FiJw-R41i5MA%2F By Daniel J. MitchellI’ve commented on the failure of Obamanomics, with special focus on how both banks and corporations are sitting on money because the investment climate is so grim. Not exactly flattering to the White House. Using Minneapolis Federal Reserve data, I’ve compared the current recovery with the expansion of the early 1980s. Once again, not good news for the Obama administration. And I’ve shared a couple of cartoons — here and here — that use humor to show the impact of bad public policy. But here’s a Bloomberg story that provides what may be the most damning evidence that the President’s big government agenda is a failure: U.S. regulators have asked some banks to take more deposits from large investors even if it’s unprofitable, and ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5169527 Fri, 26 Aug 2011 17:09:27 +0100 5169527 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5169528&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FWBHczrxLYz8%2F By Chris EdwardsAverage private sector wages in the United States rose 3.1 percent in 2010, slightly more than the 2.5 percent increase in average wages of federal civilian government workers. The growth in federal wages was the slowest in at least two decades, and it coincided with a rebound in private wages after the recession, according to new Bureau of Economic Analysis data (see Table 6.6D). Figure 1 shows average wage growth in recent years for private sector workers (blue line), federal civilian government workers (red line), and employees of the U.S. military (black line). The figure reveals the remarkable “Bush Boom” in government wages that occurred between 2001 and 2005. Over the last decade, annual average military wages rose 6.6 percent, federal civilian wages rose 5.0 pe... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5169528 Fri, 26 Aug 2011 17:01:14 +0100 5169528 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5158938&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FN4wxpT87y5U%2F By Tad DeHavenAccording to Lloyd Chapman, the hyperbolic president of the American Small Business League, legislation introduced by Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC) would close the Small Business Administration. Chapman actually stated on a Fox Business News show that Burr’s bill is “the worst idea in the history of America.” And here I thought it was Rick Santorum’s decision to run for president. Unfortunately, Burr’s legislation does not close the SBA. It merely combines the SBA, the Department of Commerce, and the Department of Labor into one bigger bureaucracy that would be known as the “Department of Commerce and the Workforce.” In other words, it just rearranges the deck chairs. Title VI of the bill spells out what programs would be terminated (not much) and I don’t see any m... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5158938 Thu, 25 Aug 2011 18:38:29 +0100 5158938 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5158942&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FfohcuDe7dLs%2F By Tad DeHavenAre you aware of the budget plan that promises to cut federal spending by 25 percent per year and has been endorsed by seven Republicans running for president? I just found out about it this week in Steve Chapman’s latest column. Having checked it out, I think I know why I hadn’t heard of it: it’s the dumbest “plan” out there. The so-called plan comes from an organization called Strong America Now, which bills itself as a “nonprofit organization dedicated to educating and mobilizing a bipartisan, grassroots effort focused on eliminating the national debt and deficit using a proven waste-elimination process called Lean Six Sigma.” I say “so-called” because I don’t see any actual plan on the organization’s website other than this: Strong America Now is pr... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5158942 Wed, 24 Aug 2011 21:00:18 +0100 5158942 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5158943&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FkYybUa_rHFo%2F By Daniel J. MitchellThe Congressional Budget Office has just released the update to its Economic and Budget Outlook. There are several things from this new report that probably deserve commentary, including a new estimate that unemployment will “remain above 8 percent until 2014.” This certainly doesn’t reflect well on the Obama White House, which claimed that flushing $800 billion down the Washington rathole would prevent the joblessness rate from ever climbing above 8 percent. Not that I have any faith in CBO estimates. After all, those bureaucrats still embrace Keynesian economics. But this post is not about the backwards economics at CBO. Instead, I want to look at the new budget forecast and see what degree of fiscal discipline is necessary to get rid of red ink. Th... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5158943 Wed, 24 Aug 2011 20:34:41 +0100 5158943 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5158944&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FhAxISFCLJSk%2F By Mark A. CalabriaI suspect not everyone looks forward to the latest issue of the Journal of Finance to the same extent I do. After all, most of the articles are fairly technical and generally lack a direct connection to public policy (my primary interest). The August issue, however, was a real exception, having a number of articles on issues related to the financial crisis. More importantly was a paper by Robert Novy-Marx and Joshua Rauh. The paper provides estimates for the unfunded liabilities inherent in our state public employee pension system.    Under fairly reasonable assumptions, the authors calculate that the net present value of unfunded liabilities is between $3.2 and $4.4 trillion. While that might seem small compared to the unfunded liabilities inherent in Medicare and ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5158944 Wed, 24 Aug 2011 18:23:49 +0100 5158944 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5158946&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FrHOSpX1Me_U%2F By Tad DeHavenThe Indianapolis Star recently ran an article on a relatively wealthy county in Indiana that has received $3 million in HUD Community Development Block Grant funding since 2005. I lived in Hamilton County for three years and it has a well-deserved reputation in Indiana as being the home of the state’s hoity-toity. I don’t believe the federal government should be subsidizing community development for any locality, but subsidizing wealthier areas of the country is extra ridiculous. From the article: Hamilton County, which automatically qualifies for the Community Development Block Grant program funding despite having one of the lowest poverty rates in the nation, has followed federal guidelines in spending its allocation… The poverty rate in Hamilton County was 5.6 percen... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5158946 Wed, 24 Aug 2011 17:32:38 +0100 5158946 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5158949&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F-rwtMJquWYA%2F By Daniel J. MitchellJust last week, I made fun of Paul Krugman after he publicly said that a fake threat from invading aliens would be good for the economy since the earth would waste a bunch of money on pointless defense outlays. Yesterday, there were rumors that Krugman stated that it would have been stimulative if the earthquake had been stronger and done more damage, but he exposed this as a prank (though it is understandable that many people — including me, I’m embarrassed to admit — initially assumed it was true since he did write that the 9-11 terrorist attacks boosted growth).  But while Krugman is owed an apology by whoever pulled that stunt, the real problem is that President Obama and his advisers actually take Keynesian alchemy seriously. And since Presid... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5158949 Wed, 24 Aug 2011 14:44:30 +0100 5158949 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5158953&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FxqV5lMD7Pyk%2F By Chris EdwardsIn his run for the Republican nomination, Texas Governor Rick Perry is positioning himself as a staunch fiscal conservative. Does his spending record match his recent campaign language in favor of smaller government? I awarded Mr. Perry grades of “B” in the last two Cato governor report cards. My analyses revealed a pretty good tax and spending record, but Perry certainly fell short of the reform-minded zeal shown by former “A” governor, Mark Sanford of South Carolina. Recent articles by Shikha Dalmia of Reason and Aman Batheja of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram suggest that Perry’s fiscal record is a mixed bag. Let’s look at the numbers. Rick Perry came into office in December 2000, which was in the middle of Texas fiscal year 2001. Texas general fund spending has... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5158953 Tue, 23 Aug 2011 19:01:30 +0100 5158953 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5139684&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FY7qfzaXp3V4%2F By Caleb O. BrownThe mortgage interest income tax deduction is popular among homeowners (read: likely voters) despite its role in distorting housing and related markets, its contribution to the housing bubble and its enabling of additional household debt. Never mind that there isn’t much evidence that the deduction boosts home ownership in the United States. Consider also that the tax break largely benefits affluent homeowners living in expensive urban areas. As Mark Calabria notes in today’s Cato Daily Podcast, it’s well past time for the mortgage interest deduction to be replaced by lower marginal tax rates for all earners. End the Mortgage Interest Deduction is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5139684 Thu, 18 Aug 2011 20:26:46 +0100 5139684 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5139950&cid=t_101646_113_f&fid=38236&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.healthcareitnews.com%2Fblog%2Fhit-outreach-should-be-%25E2%2580%259Cnews-you-can-use%25E2%2580%259D It’s pretty much a given in HIT policy circles that the public needs to know more about the potential benefits of health IT. read more (Source: Healthcare IT News Blog) Healthcare IT News Blog blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5139950 Thu, 18 Aug 2011 16:38:03 +0100 5139950 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5139691&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F1dhOJfaLKH8%2F By Daniel J. MitchellAdvocates of limited government love to fantasize. But because we’re strange people, we don’t have ordinary fantasies about supermodels or playing pro baseball. We daydream about a libertarian nirvana, where the rights of individuals are protected, guided by a moral order based on freedom and responsibility, and the leviathan state is forever constrained. Ayn Rand created a fictional version of this free society in Atlas Shrugged and called it Galt’s Gulch. But some advocates of liberty want to turn fiction into reality. Here are some excerpts from a Yahoo story about the efforts of a libertarian entrepreneur. Pay Pal founder and early Facebook investor Peter Thiel has given $1.25 million to an initiative to create floating libertarian countries in international ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5139691 Wed, 17 Aug 2011 15:51:34 +0100 5139691 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5139695&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FOehssZVSty8%2F By Tad DeHavenThe Washington Post’s editorial board issued a challenge to the president and his Republican opponents: “show us your plans” for deficit reduction. In fact, the Post says it would be “delighted” to receive plans from its readers. However, the Post isn’t interested in “meaningless promises” to cut “waste, fraud, and abuse”—it wants specifics: Here’s what we’re not looking for: pablum about eliminating unnecessary spending without identifying where. Gauzy rhetoric about making hard choices without making them. Meaningless promises about eliminating waste, fraud and abuse. Broad assertions about where to find the money — “Medicare savings,” “tax reform” — without specifics. Arbitrary spending caps without accompanying details about how those... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5139695 Tue, 16 Aug 2011 21:16:31 +0100 5139695 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5139698&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fe2yDOuRLLa8%2F By Tad DeHavenTwo polls of likely voters released by Rasmussen Reports today indicate that the federal government’s corporate welfare programs should be prime targets for spending cuts. The first poll found little support for the Small Business Administration’s lending programs: A majority (58 percent) of likely voters said that the federal government shouldn’t guarantee loans issued by private lenders to small businesses. 23 percent said the government should back small business loans and 19 percent were unsure. A majority (59 percent) of likely voters said that reducing government regulations and taxes would be more helpful to small businesses than the government providing loans to small businesses that can’t obtain financing on their own. 22 percent said the government lo... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5139698 Tue, 16 Aug 2011 18:47:19 +0100 5139698 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5139699&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F6BxVK7muBgc%2F By David BoazPresident Obama says that we are a  ”generous and compassionate” country and that “through government, we should do together what we cannot do as well for ourselves.” And to fulfill that “progressive vision,” he’s going to work on “making government smarter, and leaner and more effective. ” Today, under the rubric “Breakaway Wealth/Reaping Riches from Federal Spending,” the Washington Post gives us a front-page picture of where a lot of those generous and compassionate federal dollars actually go: Millions of dollars worth of federal contracts transformed Anita Talwar from a government accounting clerk into a wealthy woman—one who can afford a $2.8 million home in the Washington suburbs with its own elevato... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5139699 Tue, 16 Aug 2011 18:08:13 +0100 5139699 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5130727&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FdPEw5_rzjh0%2F By Daniel J. MitchellWarren Buffett’s at it again. He has a column in the New York Times complaining that he has been coddled by the tax code and that “rich” people should pay higher taxes. My first instinct is to send Buffett the website where people can voluntarily pay extra money to the federal government. I’ve made this suggestion to guilt-ridden rich people in the past. But I no longer give that advice. I’m worried he might actually do it. And even though Buffett is wildly misguided about fiscal policy, I know he will invest his money much more wisely than Barack Obama will spend it. But Buffett goes beyond guilt-ridden rants in favor of higher taxes. He makes specific assertions that are inaccurate. Last year my federal tax bill — the income tax I paid, as well as payroll... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5130727 Mon, 15 Aug 2011 18:45:01 +0100 5130727 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5130730&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fc18jJu42F6A%2F By Tad DeHavenIt’s darkly comical that the same entity responsible for killing countless private sector jobs with its taxes and regulations operates job training programs. Cato has been documenting the failures of federal job training programs for decades, but “do something” policymakers in Washington refuse to accept the reality that they’re not the solution to problems that they help create. Here’s James Bovard from a 1986 Cato policy paper on “The Failure of Federal Job Programs”: Federal job-training programs have harmed the careers of millions of Americans, failed to impart valuable job skills to the poor, and squandered billions of dollars annually. For 25 years, government programs have warped work ethics, helped disillusion generations of disadvantaged youth, and delu... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5130730 Mon, 15 Aug 2011 17:56:02 +0100 5130730 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5130731&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FACZVys0b-YU%2F By Alan ReynoldsIt is hard to imagine, but some people actually thought it was perfectly reasonable (and Constitutional) for the government to dictate to business what they should charge for their products and dictate to workers what their time was worth. I was working at J.C. Penney in Sacramento and going to grad school at night, but I took time out to send “The Case against Wage and Price Controls” to National Review in July. It became the cover story on September 24, and Bill Buckley later hired me over lunch in San Francisco. If anyone is interested, I scanned it at SCRIBD in three parts – pages 1&2, pages 3&4 and page 5. More on the 40th Anniversary of Nixon’s Wage and Price Controls is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liber... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5130731 Mon, 15 Aug 2011 17:37:37 +0100 5130731 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5125716&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FU59egslyhGY%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: If pumping up Keynesian “aggregate demand” hasn’t worked, what can policymakers do? They should focus on microeconomic reforms to spur growth over the long run. If the U.S. Postal Service is to continue operating like a business instead of becoming just another taxpayer-funded bureaucracy, Congress is going to have to hand the reins over to the private sector. Those of us who desire the limited federal government that Madison envisioned are often accused of being uncaring about those who are in need. In fact, the opposite is the truth: we recognize that government programs are wasteful, ineffective, and counterproductive to the aims that they are trying to achieve. More Medica... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5125716 Fri, 12 Aug 2011 18:33:13 +0100 5125716 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5125717&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F1PB3a5VQALI%2F By Ilya ShapiroMitt Romney’s explanation of why he’s against raising taxes on corporations — indeed, America already has some of the highest corporate tax rates in the developed world — at the Iowa State Fair was a bit awkward but not wholly incorrect.  Reason‘s Katherine Mangu-Ward has a good post with video and transcript, but here’s the salient bit: ROMNEY: We have to make sure that the promises we make — and Social Security, Medicaid, and Medicare — are promises we can keep. And there are various ways of doing that. One is, we could raise taxes on people. AUDIENCE MEMBER: Corporations! ROMNEY: Corporations are people, my friend. We can raise taxes on— AUDIENCE MEMBER: No, they’re not! ROMNEY: Of course they are. Everything corporations earn also g... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5125717 Fri, 12 Aug 2011 16:12:32 +0100 5125717 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5125719&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FN7EN95OQlFI%2F By Daniel J. MitchellAllen Meltzer, an economist at Carnegie Mellon University, writes today in the Wall Street Journal about the Fed’s worrisome announcement that it will continue the easy-money policy of artificially low interest rates. Professor Meltzer’s key point (at least to me) is that the economy is weak because of too much government intervention and too much federal spending, and you don’t solve those problems with a loose-money policy – especially since banks already are sitting on $1.6 trillion of excess reserves. (Why lend money when the economy is weak and you may not get repaid?) Meltzer then outlines some of the reforms that would boost growth, all of which are desirable, albeit a bit tame for my tastes: [T]he United States does not have the kind of problems that pr... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5125719 Fri, 12 Aug 2011 15:14:25 +0100 5125719 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5118604&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FPw15ihhth60%2F By Tad DeHavenAn essay on terminating the Small Business Administration has been added to Cato’s Downsizing Government website. Some highlights: Established in 1953, the agency had earned the nickname “Small Scandal Administration” by the mid-70s. President Reagan’s budget director, David Stockman, called it a “billion dollar waste—a rat hole” that benefited few small businesses, while distorting credit markets. Unfortunately, both Republicans and Democrats have continued to support it. The SBA guarantees loans issued by private lenders for up to 85 percent of losses in the event that loan recipients default. As a result of the guarantee, lenders are more willing to lend money to riskier applicants because the SBA is ultimately responsible for the bulk of any losses. The S... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5118604 Thu, 11 Aug 2011 16:59:06 +0100 5118604 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5118610&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Ffr7x6uGcJwg%2F By Daniel J. MitchellI wrote earlier this year about the connection between a morally corrupt welfare state and the riots in the United Kingdom. But what’s happening now is not just some left-wing punks engaging in political street theater. Instead, the UK is dealing with a bigger problem of societal decay caused in part by a government’s failure to fulfill one of its few legitimate functions: protection of property. To make matters worse, the political class has disarmed law-abiding people, thus exacerbating the risks. These two photos are a pretty good summary of what this means. On the left, we have Korean entrepreneurs using guns to defend themselves from murdering thugs during the 1992 LA riots. On the right, we have Turkish entrepreneurs reduced to using their fists (and some hid... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5118610 Wed, 10 Aug 2011 14:31:49 +0100 5118610 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5118612&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FI7N0AIflcIg%2F By Tad DeHavenDavid Boaz’s post on bizarre and utterly preposterous claims that the federal government’s “social safety net” has been shrinking brought to my mind James Madison’s position that “Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.” “The Father of the Constitution” wasn’t being cold-hearted when he took this position during a 1794 debate in the House of Representatives over federal aid to refugees. Rather, he was merely recognizing that “the government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects.” Charity just wasn’t one of the specified objects. Of course, future politicians decided otherwise. Today, most young Americans grow up in federally subsidized schools offering federally subsidized meals. They are i... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5118612 Tue, 09 Aug 2011 21:01:59 +0100 5118612 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5107485&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FER-GWYuse8w%2F By David BoazLiz Marlantes of the Christian Science Monitor joins other pundits in proclaiming “America’s Big Shift Right” in politics and governance. “In Washington today, when it comes to the size of government, the debate isn’t over whether to cut spending, but by how much,” she writes.  That’s true, but it’s because the federal budget has doubled in just 10 years, with half the increase coming in the past three. Politics may be more conservative, but government is still getting bigger. Some of Marlantes’s arguments are mystifying: “Instead of coming on the heels of a great liberal expansion of government, today’s shift comes after three decades of the unraveling of elements of the social safety net.” Really? The C... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5107485 Tue, 09 Aug 2011 13:59:22 +0100 5107485 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5107916&cid=t_101646_155_f&fid=39053&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcommunity.advanceweb.com%2Fblogs%2Fal_2%2Farchive%2F2011%2F08%2F09%2Fdebt-ceiling-plan-calls-for-2-medicare-physician-cuts-if-bipartisan-committee-misses-plan-deadline.aspx Medicare providers could face 2% in cuts starting Jan. 1, 2013, as part of debt ceiling legislation passed by Congress and signed by President Obama Aug. 2, according to news on the College of American Pathologists website. The 2% cut would be enacted...(read more) (Source: ADVANCE Discourse: Lab) ADVANCE Discourse: Lab blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5107916 Tue, 09 Aug 2011 12:27:00 +0100 5107916 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5107487&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FMeqx98JbX5Q%2F By Caleb O. BrownCato Senior Fellow Jagadeesh Gokhale argues today that S&P has left little doubt that credit rating agencies’ credibility has suffered because of the recent downgrade of U.S. Treasuries. He argues that the response from the President leaves much to be desired. On the tax increases proposed by the President today to cover entitlement spending, he says It’s basically impossible to tax our way out of this commitment. If we try to impose huge taxes on the backs of workers and younger generations, we will destroy the incentives to work and destroy the incentives to people who can provide capital to provide it in the U.S. They would take that capital and migrate to other shores. In other words, the taxes required to pay for past promises are uncollectible. Listen... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5107487 Mon, 08 Aug 2011 20:45:02 +0100 5107487 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5107489&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F5kOy3w40Zrc%2F By Alan ReynoldsThe infamous $2 trillion error involved in the Standard and Poor’s downgrade was no mistake.  It was largely the result of an unseemly urge to take sides in the partisan struggle over near-term tax policy, with no weight at all given to longer-term entitlement spending. “Our ratings,” the agency later explained, “are determined primarily using a 3-5 year time horizon,” and “the ratings decision to lower the long-term rating to AA+ from AAA was not affected by the change of assumptions regarding the pace of discretionary spending growth.”  In other words, it’s all about taxes. Amazingly, the S&P analysts adopted the Congressional Budget Office “alternative” scenario as their so-called baseline.  In that scenario all Bush tax cuts remain in pla... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5107489 Mon, 08 Aug 2011 19:34:54 +0100 5107489 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5107490&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FsIIy7QIG65A%2F By Daniel J. MitchellPresident Obama just spoke about the downgrade and his remarks were very disappointing. He uttered some empty platitudes, offered no plan, (amazingly) called for more government spending, and continued his advocacy of class-warfare taxation. So what does this mean? Other than expecting volatility, I have no idea what will happen in financial markets over the next few days. But I can opine about the downgrade, Obama’s unserious response, and what it means in terms of public policy over the next few years and into the future. Notwithstanding the President’s cavalier attitude, America is in trouble. But while the crisis is severe, we have some breathing room. Our fiscal crisis is akin to a very dangerous, but slow-developing cancer. It is not a car wreck with ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5107490 Mon, 08 Aug 2011 18:59:48 +0100 5107490 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5107492&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FKTBMGBPk7xM%2F By Daniel J. MitchellEven though I predicted it had to happen at some point because of the Bush-Obama spending binge and America’s giant long-run entitlement crisis, I confess that I’m somewhat surprised that the United States has suffered a debt downgrade for the first time. That being said, I don’t think the downgrade will matter. Everyone knew the U.S. was heading in the wrong direction before the announcement by Standard & Poor. Moreover, big investors have very few attractive options for where to place their money – thanks to a weak global economy. As such, I suspect the federal government will still be able to borrow money at very low rates. What does matter, however, is that the American economy is burdened with a bloated public sector that is sapping the nation’s econ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5107492 Mon, 08 Aug 2011 15:12:13 +0100 5107492 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5107493&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FH_7njf0d_Wg%2F By David BoazA letter in the Washington Post from Dale Everett of Ashburn, Va., makes a point about the sustainability of our entitlements programs: At 80, I am a “poster boy” for what is wrong with Medicare and Social Security. I worked full time from 1950 until 1993, when I retired. I paid the maximum amount annually required by law. My payment from Social Security in 1993 was $1,170 per month, and it now exceeds $1,500. I paid $47,377 into the fund and have so far received more than $288,000 from it. As for Medicare I paid $14,350 into the fund from 1966 to 1993. I have been very healthy but had cancer several years ago and a craniotomy five years ago. The costs of those exceeded $1 million. Even minor surgery would far exceed what I paid to the fund. Please tell me how such a syste... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5107493 Mon, 08 Aug 2011 14:19:01 +0100 5107493 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5103329&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FjyFTnwVsWgc%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: Republicans and Democrats have come together on a “historic” budget deal that cuts federal spending by more than $2 trillion over 10 years. However, the budget deal doesn’t cut federal spending at all. Even if Congress holds to the debt deal’s spending caps — and even if the “deficit reduction” targets established in the bill are achieved — the federal government’s spending binge will continue. Debt deal to slow the economy? Nonsense: biggest stimulus, slowest recovery. Keynesianism isn’t working. Centrist and liberal columnists are lamenting the lack of tax increases in the debt deal. But the hollowness of the deal itself provides a good justification for ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5103329 Fri, 05 Aug 2011 16:58:35 +0100 5103329 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5097089&cid=t_101646_150_f&fid=35777&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FPharmalot%2F%7E3%2F4FWgf9Og79Y%2F Concerned that the Office of Management and Budget is trying to gut a proposal to strengthen conflicts of interest rules for National Institutes of Health grant recipients (back story), US Senator Chuck Grassley is leaning on the OMB to cough up documents that may expose its role in the episode. In a letter sent today to OMB director Jacob Lew, Grassley asks for all records relating to communications between OMB staff and the US Department of Health & Human Services about the COI proposal, which the NIH issued in May 2010. In particular, he is targeting Cass Sunstein (see photo), who is the administrator for the OMB Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. The OMB site does not appear to list any meetings with the OIRA or public comments issued (see this and this). “I am tr... Pharmalot blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5097089 Thu, 04 Aug 2011 19:19:29 +0100 5097089 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5096165&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FQhw6yaMzoPU%2F By Chris EdwardsEveryone agrees that it’s rather stupid for a federal funding dispute to idle about 70,000 workers on airport-related construction. Just as absurd, there have been 20 stop-gap funding bills passed for the FAA since 2007. News stories are digging into the political disputes surrounding the FAA, but they aren’t addressing the root problem. The root problem is that we have federalized the funding of airports in this country, when there is absolutely no need to. Airports are generally owned by state and local governments, and it should be up to them to figure out how to finance them. By federalizing infrastructure financing, we are simply encouraging the misallocation of resources through the political pork barrel. We should get the federal government out of financing airpo... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5096165 Thu, 04 Aug 2011 14:58:49 +0100 5096165 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5096168&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FsQf6f1NHF7Q%2F By Chris EdwardsCentrist and liberal columnists are lamenting the lack of tax increases in the debt deal. But the hollowness of the deal itself provides a good justification for Republicans to oppose all tax increases in such bipartisan deals. The federal debt crisis is being caused by spending increases, not revenue shortfalls. When the economy recovers, revenues will rise to the normal level of about 18 percent of GDP, even with all current tax cuts in place. It is spending that is projected to rise to abnormal levels, as I discussed in my recent Senate testimony. However, let’s say a fiscal conservative in Congress was willing to swap, say, $1 of tax increases for $3 of spending cuts in a deficit-reduction deal. Most likely, the tax increases would turn out to be real and damaging, bu... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5096168 Wed, 03 Aug 2011 17:20:39 +0100 5096168 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5096169&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FZOrZ812LqXk%2F By Benjamin H. FriedmanThe legislation signed by President Obama yesterday, as a solution to the debt ceiling debate, includes the possibility of cuts to military spending. But as Chris Preble points out, the legislation guarantees no defense cuts. Republicans will try to dump all the required cuts on non-defense areas. And the White House has already distanced itself from the prospect of any real defense budget cuts, as did Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta. Both support only the first round of cuts, which will at best halt Pentagon growth at roughly inflation. On The Skeptics blog, I take a more detailed look at deal’s likely impact on military spending. I also examine its political effect, arguing that it will cause at least four political fights. The first concerns war fun... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5096169 Wed, 03 Aug 2011 16:29:42 +0100 5096169 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5096172&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FtZIi4Y441gQ%2F By Chris EdwardsThe Washington Post reports that spending cuts in the budget deal threaten to slow the economy. The article quotes a number of economists who seem to harbor a rather extreme Keynesian bias in their thinking. The deal would cut discretionary spending by just $21 billion in 2012, or just 0.6 percent of total federal spending that year. And that’s after federal spending has risen 22 percent since 2008 ($2.98 trillion in 2008 to about $3.63 trillion this year). Even if you believe that government spending helps the economy, it seems rather bizarre to claim that a 0.6 percent retrenchment after a 22 percent increase would hurt. The other thing to note about these spending-cut worries is that, for Keynesians, it is the total amount of deficit spending that is the amount of econ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5096172 Tue, 02 Aug 2011 21:01:31 +0100 5096172 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5096173&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FF6-7Vn4OSSM%2F By John SamplesGreg Sargent cites a CNN poll question: As you may know, the agreement would cut about one trillion dollars in government spending over the next ten years with provisions to make additional spending cuts in the future. Regardless of how you feel about the overall agreement, do you approve or disapprove of the cuts in government spending included in the debt ceiling agreement? Approve 65 Disapprove 30 Sargent continues: Sixty five percent approve of deal’s spending cuts. But it gets worse. Of the 30 percent who disapprove, 13 percent think the cuts haven’t gotten far enough, and only 15 percent think the cuts go too far. One sixth of Americans agree with the liberal argument about the deal. About 20 percent of Americans self-identify as liberals. This would suggest that ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5096173 Tue, 02 Aug 2011 20:18:10 +0100 5096173 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5096175&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FijhtsfNNy8E%2F By Caleb O. Brown This week’s bipartisan deal to raise the debt limit will do little in the way of actual spending cuts, it defers all the tough decisions on spending and debt to a “SuperCongress” committee and the deal will do little to protect the United States credit rating. Cato’s Dan Mitchell, Jagadeesh Gokhale and Chris Edwards comment on the debt deal. On Debt Ceiling, Congress Kicks the Can is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5096175 Tue, 02 Aug 2011 18:06:07 +0100 5096175 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5086140&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FpOd4wAOhFbY%2F By Tad DeHavenThe following chart looks at total projected federal spending according to the Congressional Budget Office’s adjusted March baseline and it’s score of the debt deal. The chart only considers the reduction in outlays resulting from the deal’s cap on discretionary spending, which the CBO says will save $917 billion over the next ten years.  It does not consider the $1.2-$1.5 trillion in future “deficit reduction” that Dan Mitchell discusses here. Excluding outlays for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which are unlikely to materialize, total spending over the next ten years would be about $43 trillion under the discretionary spending caps instead of $44 trillion . In other words, even if Congress holds to the caps — and even if the “d... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5086140 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 20:59:33 +0100 5086140 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5086141&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FXHhlVhgZfyk%2F By Neal McCluskeyWan to know a major reason Washington won’t make the cuts we need? Because winning elections is largely about getting “middle-class” votes, and just about any program can be spun as a savior for that big — but rarely defined by politicians — chunk of Americans. Case in point, an animosity-stoking assertion uttered last week by House education committee Ranking Member George Miller.  As reported by CNN, the subject was the possibility of a cut being made to the federal Pell Grant program: Rep. George Miller, a California Democrat, defended Pell Grant funding on Friday, calling it the “great equalizer” for millions of students. “Pell is the reason they are able to go to college and get ahead,” Miller sai... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5086141 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 19:43:38 +0100 5086141 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5086142&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fvob1l9ZUg34%2F By Christopher PrebleThe budget deal announced last night offers two sets of potential cuts in military spending. The first set of potential cuts, created by the budget caps, target “security” spending. That includes the Pentagon, State, foreign aid, the Department of Homeland Security and Veterans (the discretionary portion of Veterans spending, to be precise). The deal caps “security” spending at $684 billion for this fiscal year and $686 for the next. That requires little pain; the 2012 security cap is only $5 billion below what we’ll spend on those categories in fiscal 2011. The White House claims that the caps will generate $350 billion in savings from base defense spending for ten years. They get there, dubiously, by projecting security spending at the capped le... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5086142 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 18:15:34 +0100 5086142 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5085584&cid=t_101646_139_f&fid=38879&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FVirologyBlog%2F%7E3%2Fsa2sstw4H7s%2F Eugenie Samuel Reich speculates about the effect on US science should the debt ceiling not be raised by 2 August 2011: Republicans have made it clear that they will not cut defence spending, and Democrats are keen to protect social security and health-care programmes such as Medicare and Medicaid. Thus, the cuts are likely to fall on the roughly $600-billion discretionary, domestic budget, which includes funding for scientific agencies including the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Department of Energy’s Office of Science. A reduction of $100 billion, applied across the board, would result in a 17% cut to such agencies. Excellent discussion of best- and worst-case scenarios and their effect on science, ‘an investment in future p... virology blog blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5085584 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 15:35:04 +0100 5085584 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5086146&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F0waOHosDchA%2F By Michael D. TannerThe deal that President Obama and congressional leaders may well be the best deal that Republicans could get – and any deal that makes Paul Krugman this apoplectic can’t be all bad – but it should not be considered a solution to our fiscal problems.   In the face of a $1.1 trillion budget deficit, a $14.3 trillion official debt, and a real indebtedness of more than $120 trillion, the deal would reduce the baseline increase in planned spending initially by about $1 trillion, or an average of roughly $100 billion per year – less than the federal government will borrow this month.   Moreover, the cuts are unspecific – apparently Congress still can’t find actual programs to eliminate – raising the specter that it will employ the same budgetary gimm... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5086146 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 13:27:25 +0100 5086146 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5086147&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fnv9wY4H_nqU%2F By David BoazAt the Encyclopedia Britannica Blog I take a look at the media drumbeat on “default”: The establishment media have been waving around the word “default” like a bloody shirt, trying desperately to pressure the Tea Party Republicans to give in and raise the debt ceiling already. Both theNew York Times and the Washington Post on Sunday had “default” in the first sentence on the front page. Saturday’s Post featured “default” in the first line on its homepage, in the first sentence on page 1, in the first economy/business story, and on page 1 of the Real Estate section. Friday’s CBS Evening News began, “Tonight, we are almost out of time. That was President Obama’s warning as Congress groped for a way to avoid a government default.” But ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5086147 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 12:28:48 +0100 5086147 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5086148&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FHxN0VDfJsuQ%2F By Daniel J. MitchellPoliticians last night announced the framework of a deal to increase the debt limit. In addition to authorizing about $900 billion more red ink right away, it would require immediate budget cuts of more than $900 billion, though “immediate” means over 10 years and “budget cuts” means spending still goes up (but not as fast as previously planned). But that’s the relatively uncontroversial part. The fighting we’re seeing today revolves around a “super-committee” that’s been created to find $1.5 trillion of additional “deficit reduction” over the next 10 years (based on Washington math, of course). And much of the squabbling deals with whether the super-committee is a vehicle for higher taxes. As with all k... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5086148 Mon, 01 Aug 2011 12:27:49 +0100 5086148 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5086149&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F4iF1ARFK_3I%2F By Daniel J. MitchellWhile driving home last night, I had the miserable experience of listening to a financial journalist being interviewed about the anemic growth numbers that were just released. I wasn’t unhappy because the interview was biased to the left. From what I could tell, both the host and the guest were straight shooters. Indeed, they spent some time speculating that the economy’s weak performance was bad news for Obama. What irked me was the implicit Keynesian thinking in the interview. Both of them kept talking about how the economy would have been weaker in the absence of government spending, and they fretted that “austerity” in Washington could further slow the economy in the future. This was especially frustrating for me since I’ve spent years... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5086149 Sun, 31 Jul 2011 13:13:51 +0100 5086149 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5077654&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FGVNLZMp-uPk%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: If it is true that a failure to increase the debt limit on August 2nd has the potential to bring about economic Armageddon, shouldn’t we be asking ourselves if it’s a good idea to allow the political class in Washington to continue to collectively play God with our lives? The ratchet effect: agriculture edition. Chris Edwards testifies to the Senate Finance Committee on federal spending and debt. These are the times that try budget analysts’ souls—especially budget analysts who’d like to see Washington dramatically cut spending. House Speaker John Boehner’s first budget plan wouldn’t have cut spending. His new plan won’t cut spending either. Chris Edwards... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5077654 Fri, 29 Jul 2011 18:51:00 +0100 5077654 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5077656&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FuSU2KRKUUdU%2F By Roger PilonToday POLITICO Arena asks: Is it the Senate’s turn to take a crack at the debt ceiling? My response: Speaker Boehner has both the Constitution and convention on his side — “money bills” arise in the House. In fact, the Constitution is his strongest ally in his struggle to win the support of recalcitrant Tea Party members. They revere the document, after all, and no one has put the point better than Charles Krauthammer in this morning’s Washington Post. Boehner’s bill, just to be clear, is a far cry from what this debt-ridden nation needs. As my colleague Chris Edwards put it yesterday, even the revised plan “doesn’t cut spending at all.” It “cuts” only from the CBO baseline, which assumes constantly rising spendin... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5077656 Fri, 29 Jul 2011 14:40:44 +0100 5077656 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5077660&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F_ghTb79j36M%2F By Chris EdwardsHouse Speaker John Boehner has revised his budget plan in response to an unfavorable analysis by the CBO. The CBO has examined Boehner’s new plan and finds that it would cut spending by $917 billion over 10 years. Of the total, only $761 billion would be cuts to programs. The rest of the savings would be from reduced interest costs. Actually, the revised Boehner plan doesn’t cut spending at all. The chart shows the discretionary spending caps in the new Boehner plan. Spending increases every year—from $1.043 trillion in 2012 to $1.234 trillion in 2021. (These figures exclude the costs of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan). The “cuts” in the Boehner plan are only cuts from the CBO baseline, which is an assumed path of constantly rising spending. If Congress wanted ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5077660 Thu, 28 Jul 2011 15:40:45 +0100 5077660 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5077662&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FOErsIXsuuXQ%2F By Neal McCluskeyA couple of days ago I blasted President Obama for, in repugnant tradition, using “education” as a political weapon, invoking it to scare Americans into demanding increased taxes for “the rich.” House Speaker John Boehner, thankfully, did not abuse education similarly in his rebuttal. But his proposal for raising the debt ceiling illustrates just how weak the GOP’s commitment is to returning the federal government to its constitutional — and affordable — size. And I say this not because of the relative puniness of his proposed cuts, but what the proposal would do in education, the only area it specifically targets: increase funding for Pell Grants. Now, I know what many people will say to this: Pell is a de facto ent... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5077662 Thu, 28 Jul 2011 14:46:25 +0100 5077662 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5077664&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F5l-dpRVXrKU%2F By Daniel J. MitchellI testified yesterday before the Joint Economic Committee about budget process reform. As part of the Q&A session after the testimony, one of the Democratic members made a big deal about the fact that federal tax revenues today are “only” consuming about 15 percent of GDP. And since the long-run average is about 18 percent of GDP, we are all supposed to conclude that a substantial tax hike is needed as part of what President Obama calls a “balanced approach” to red ink. But it’s not just statist politicians making this argument. After making fun of his assertion that Obama is a conservative, I was hoping to ignore Bruce Bartlett for a while, but I noticed that he has a piece on the New York Times website also implying that America&#821... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5077664 Thu, 28 Jul 2011 12:40:44 +0100 5077664 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069432&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FPAqdTkCxgCg%2F By Chris EdwardsThe USPS is proposing to close 3,700 post office locations across the country, as mail volume falls and the agency is losing billions of dollars. Kudos to Postmaster Patrick Donahoe for cutting costs, but he missed at least one location. He should add to his list one of the two offices in my neighborhood, which are only a mile apart. For its story today, the Washington Post went looking for citizens who would complain about the reform, and they found some. One lady in Chevy Chase, Maryland, groused that the post office near her is “part of the culture of the town.” Boy, does that town’s culture ever need help if a sterile government office plays a key role! Anyway, my neighborhood lost its “culture” when the Borders book store closed last weekend. But that’s lif... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069432 Wed, 27 Jul 2011 18:58:17 +0100 5069432 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069434&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F_a7Tyv-Z7Y8%2F By Roger PilonEncouraging President Obama to play Robin Hood—as if he needed encouragement—a group of religious leaders met with the president at the White House last week where they admonished him “to protect Medicaid, food stamps, aid to poor women with infant children, international development aid and other programs specifically targeted to the poor,” the Washington Post reports. Led by the progressive evangelical group Sojourners, and joined by other Christian organizations from across the political spectrum, these are the folks about whom I wrote in the Wall Street Journal last April after they ran ads with the headline, “What Would Jesus Cut?” Now that they’re using not simply the budget debates but the debt ceiling battle to promote their agenda, two points are worth ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069434 Wed, 27 Jul 2011 16:22:49 +0100 5069434 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069435&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F9z_db8dIDdQ%2F By Chris EdwardsHouse Speaker John Boehner is scrambling to revise his budget plan after the CBO found that it would only cut spending by $850 billion, not the $1.2 trillion promised. However, the Boehner plan doesn’t actually cut spending at all. The chart shows the discretionary spending caps in the Boehner plan. Spending increases every year—from $1.043 trillion in 2012 to $1,234 trillion in 2021. (This category of spending excludes the costs of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan). The “cuts” in the Boehner plan are only cuts from the CBO baseline, which is an imaginary path of future spending designed as a planning tool for Congress. Boehner can propose to spend any amount in any future year he wants, and in this plan he choose to have a steadily rising spending path. The Boehne... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069435 Wed, 27 Jul 2011 16:05:21 +0100 5069435 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069437&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fvy7iOhTmm4w%2F By David BoazOn the front page of today’s Washington Post, above the fold, a news story begins: If nothing else, the crisis over the debt ceiling is reminding the country of the astonishing reach of the federal spigot, encapsulated by a figure that President Obama tossed out recently: The government sends out “70 million checks” every month. Reporter Alec MacGillis went on to note that the president underestimated: The figures used by Obama and Geithner were, if anything, too low. They relied on Treasury Department figures from June that include Social Security (56 million checks that month), veterans benefits (4.5 million checks), and spending on non-defense contractors and vendors (1.8 million checks). But those numbers do not include reimbursements to Medicare providers and... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069437 Wed, 27 Jul 2011 15:36:43 +0100 5069437 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069438&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FWaVA9VLjGkM%2F By Michael F. CannonI’m still trying to figure out what I think about the debt-limit fight. As a policy matter, I want to cut the federal government’s claim on the people’s economic resources by much more than 40 percent.  (Dear critics, please note that it’s no kind of objection to say that cuts of that magnitude would cause vulnerable people pain.  The alternatives — higher taxes or a Greek-style debt crisis — would also cause vulnerable people pain.  In my estimation, they would cause more pain to greater numbers of vulnerable people.) Where I get queasy is when people make credible arguments that not raising the debt limit would result in such a political backlash that it would  compromise efforts to cut federal spending. Which is why I found t... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069438 Wed, 27 Jul 2011 15:28:49 +0100 5069438 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069441&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F-ptqhNzL54Q%2F By Daniel J. MitchellI testified before the House Ways & Means Committee yesterday. As always, my trip inside the belly of the beast was an interesting adventure. The tax-writing committee was holding a hearing on the value-added tax. I was on a panel with five other witnesses, and all of the other people testifying were sympathetic to a VAT. But since I had truth on my side, that made it a fair fight (though it did cross my mind that it’s not a good sign when a Republican-controlled committee stacks the witnesses in favor of a European-style tax system). I made two points. First, a VAT is less destructive than the current income tax. As such, if we somehow repealed the 16th Amendment and replaced it with something ironclad that would prevent the income tax from ever again haunti... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069441 Wed, 27 Jul 2011 12:35:13 +0100 5069441 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069444&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FiwiXkM-Rmxs%2F By Tad DeHavenThese are the times that try budget analysts’ souls—especially budget analysts who’d like to see Washington dramatically cut spending. The debate over lifting the debt ceiling has produced a number of proposals from Capitol Hill—none of them have been worth celebrating. We can now add House Speaker John Boehner’s latest proposal to the pile. Boehner’s proposal boils down to the following: cap discretionary spending over 10 years to achieve $1.2 trillion in savings; have (another) bipartisan group of policymakers come up with $1.8 trillion in “deficit reductions” over ten years; and get a vote on a balanced budget amendment. In exchange, the president would get to increase the deficit by $900 billion this year and by another $1.6 trillion next year. Here are so... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069444 Tue, 26 Jul 2011 20:11:29 +0100 5069444 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069447&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FtqQe3o3ngFU%2F By Chris EdwardsI testified to the Senate Finance Committee today regarding federal spending and debt. Here are some of the points I made: Last night, President Obama called for a “balanced solution” to our fiscal problems, including tax increases and spending cuts. However, CBO projections do not indicate that we face a “balanced” problem. Instead, projections show that the deficit problem is caused all on the spending side of the budget. The United States has sadly become a big-government country. Until recently, government spending in this country was about 10 percentage points less than the average of OECD countries. That smaller-government advantage has now shrunken to just 4 percentage points. In recent years, policymakers have given us the largest deficit... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069447 Tue, 26 Jul 2011 18:05:25 +0100 5069447 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5069449&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FBjcOn1sbcrE%2F By Michael F. CannonI’m a few days behind on this, but over at The Corner Yuval Levin has written an important post about how health care entitlements are the real cause of the debt crisis facing the federal government. Using Congressional Budget Office projections, Levin creates this magnificent chart, which I plan to steal over and over again: If Republicans want to conquer the federal debt, they need to embrace health policy like they embrace tax cuts. Health Care Entitlements Are the Real Debt Bomb is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5069449 Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:55:19 +0100 5069449 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5062220&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FFf8CffTfUuY%2F Between the lines of a front-page Wall Street Journal article about farm subsidies [$] is an instructive example of the ratchet effect: Land prices are way up and so are bank deposits, as high corn and soybean prices mean local farmers are making the most money in their lives…An exception to the boom is the local office of the U.S. Agriculture Department, the dispensary of federal payments to farmers from an array of arcane programs with names like ‘loan deficiency’ and ‘milk income loss.’ On a recent afternoon, the parking lot in front of the squat brick building behind a Chinese restaurant was nearly empty. The reason: Payments from America’s primary farm-subsidy program, dating from the 1930s, have stopped here. Grain prices are far too high to trigger payouts under the ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5062220 Mon, 25 Jul 2011 20:07:59 +0100 5062220 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5062225&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FmUjuFzdO54U%2F Council on Foreign Relations President Richard Haass has just published an article in Time magazine (also available here) that challenges many of the comfortable nostrums guiding U.S. foreign policy for at least the last twenty years. He scores a 9 out of 10 in his analysis of what is wrong: we have an inordinate fear of things that shouldn’t be that frightening; we have a misplaced faith in our ability to fix nettlesome problems in distant lands; and we repeatedly stumble into costly and counterproductive wars that we should generally avoid. Haass then proposes a new doctrine to “help establish priorities and steer the allocation of resources” and “that fits the U.S.’s circumstances.”  It is one that judges the world to be relatively nonthreatening and... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5062225 Mon, 25 Jul 2011 14:53:14 +0100 5062225 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5062228&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F_DLOOm8e3pY%2F Lost in all the concerns over how Moody’s and S&P will view any deal to raise the debt ceiling and whether such a deal addresses our country’s long term budget imbalances is the fact that at least three rating agencies have already downgraded U.S. government debt.  One of these agencies, Weiss Ratings, treats U.S. government debt as barely better than “junk” or speculative grade. It would be easy to dismiss these agencies as irrelevant and attempting to simply grab attention, but at least one of these agencies, Egan-Jones, has a track record of correctly predicting problems at such companies as Enron, WorldCom, Global Crossing, Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers that the major rating agencies missed until it was too late.  Egan-Jones also employs a business mode... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5062228 Mon, 25 Jul 2011 12:49:04 +0100 5062228 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5057712&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FMkqGhuZSPhU%2F Over at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: It’s time to repeal New Deal labor laws. A new Cato video on the “Cut, Cap, and Balance” proposal. $2 trillion in spending cuts in exchange for raising the debt ceiling isn’t enough. Congratulations to Sen. Tom Coburn’s staff for producing a massive study chock-full of specific spending-cut ideas. The Gang of Six deficit reduction plan is lousy. Chris Preble on the hysteria over potential cuts in military spending. Follow Downsizing the Federal Government on Twitter (@DownsizeTheFeds) and connect with us on Facebook. This Week in Government Failure is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5057712 Fri, 22 Jul 2011 19:34:39 +0100 5057712 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5057713&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fh5njg4-TRIw%2F If it is true that a failure to increase the debt limit on August 2nd has the potential to bring about economic Armageddon, shouldn’t we be asking ourselves if it’s a good idea to allow the political class in Washington to continue collectively play God with our lives? After all, these people are fallible human beings. In a similar vein, Sheldon Richman reminds us of what government really is in a new column on the issue of federal debt. I like Richman’s statement because one need not be a hardcore libertarian to appreciate the message: Government is not some higher super-competent entity like the man pretending to be the Wizard of Oz wanted the people to think he was. It’s a coercive organization of limited, flawed, and essentially ignorant men and women who, having been anointed ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5057713 Fri, 22 Jul 2011 19:03:16 +0100 5057713 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5057714&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FJnvIEsa1Mhk%2F An op-ed by Peter Singer and Michael O’Hanlon in today’s Politico questions the impact of spending cuts on the military. “Substantial defense budget cuts are possible, make no mistake,” the Brookings’ scholars concede, “But they could mean loss of capability, and some may increase security risks.” Another Brookings scholar, Robert Kagan, is more emphatic, telling Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post that “[The proposed cuts are] utterly irresponsible and dangerous to national security.” Max Boot agrees. Cuts of up to $1 trillion over the next 10 years “would be nothing short of a disaster.” Lawmakers who are considering such cuts, Boot claims, “are flirting with eviscerating American combat capabilities — and with it t... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5057714 Fri, 22 Jul 2011 17:53:00 +0100 5057714 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5050526&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FkEln6-tme7A%2F Stories in DoD Buzz and the Christian Science Monitor this week cover a new Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment report on the Pentagon’s 2012 budget request. Both articles focus on the insightful section of the report explaining how the post 9-11 defense spending explosion has barely increased our war-fighting capacity. Unfortunately, both echo the report’s claim that all money spent on cancelled programs is money wasted and an indictment of the Pentagon acquisition system (page 36 and 37). Here’s how the Monitor put it: The new spending involves considerable waste, the report says. The Pentagon has spent nearly $50 billion since the 9/11 attacks on weapons systems that it never used due to technological failures or cost overruns, according to the study. “These are weapon... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5050526 Thu, 21 Jul 2011 12:57:56 +0100 5050526 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5050527&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FXbSAktKmgNA%2F My colleague Dan Mitchell discussed the good, the bad, and the ugly in the deficit reduction plan released by the bipartisan group of senators known as the “Gang of Six.”  As Dan noted, the plan is more of an outline and a complete assessment isn’t possible until more details emerge. However, the fact that President Obama immediately embraced the plan ought to tell proponents of limited government all they need to know. Here are some random thoughts on the plan: There’s nothing impressive about the “immediate” $500 billion in deficit reduction. That figure includes revenue increases, so it’s not even $500 billion in spending cuts. And I’m not sure why they say “immediate” when they probably mean that the reductions would occur over the next several fiscal years. The d... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5050527 Thu, 21 Jul 2011 12:55:49 +0100 5050527 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5050529&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F01Hsa0pm0OM%2F The “Gang of Six” senators has released an outline of budget reforms that would supposedly reduce deficits by $3.7 trillion over 10 years. Revenues would rise by at least $1 trillion, while spending would be theoretically trimmed by various procedural mechanisms. The plan promises to “strengthen the safety net,” “maintain investments,” and “maintain the basic structure” of Medicare and Medicaid, which doesn’t sound very reform-minded to me. The Gang of Six plan is a grander version of Sen. Mitch McConnell’s recent debt-limit proposal, which was aimed at putting off any spending cuts. The Gang outline has a few specific cuts, but the document mainly consists of promises to restrain spending and raise taxes in the future. I’m surprised that Sen. Tom Coburn supports the ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5050529 Wed, 20 Jul 2011 18:24:21 +0100 5050529 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5050534&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FzE5hTHeZnEM%2F The American welfare state has been in crisis for decades. Many of the problems faced in 1995 fight have become less tractable problems today. John Samples comments in yesterday’s Cato Daily Podcast. One notable difference between 1995 and today, Samples says, is that the GOP of 1995 kept Social Security off the chopping block for spending cuts. Subscribe to the podcast here (RSS) and here (iTunes). Parallels to 1995 in Spending Fight is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5050534 Wed, 20 Jul 2011 12:44:31 +0100 5050534 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5050535&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F0FczLaTHxGI%2F At the Encyclopedia Britannica blog, I take on the argument made, for instance, by President Obama in his Friday news conference: We should not be asking sacrifices from middle-class folks who are working hard every day, from the most vulnerable in our society — we should not be asking them to make sacrifices if we’re not asking the most fortunate in our society to make some sacrifices as well. I call that a fundamentally flawed argument: The main thing our government does these days, despite the lack of any constitutional authority for it, is tax some people and transfer money to other people. …But there is no moral equivalence in the two sides of the transfer system. On the one hand, the government takes money by force from people who have earned it. On the other hand, it g... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5050535 Tue, 19 Jul 2011 19:59:23 +0100 5050535 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5050537&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FtukJttLWUFI%2F The on-again, off-again “Gang of Six” has come back on the scene and is offering a “Bipartisan Plan to Reduce Our Nation’s Deficits.” The proposal is quite similar to the one put forth by the President’s Simpson-Bowles Commission, which isn’t too surprising since some of the same people are involved. At this stage, all I’ve seen is this summary (A BIPARTISAN PLAN TO REDUCE OUR NATIONS DEFICITS v7), so I reserve the right to modify my analysis as more details emerge (and since I fully expect the plan to look worse when additional information is available, the following is an optimistic assessment. The Good Unlike President Obama, the Gang of Six is not consumed by class-warfare resentment. The plan envisions that the top personal income tax rate will fall to no higher than ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5050537 Tue, 19 Jul 2011 18:36:45 +0100 5050537 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5036234&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=39187&url=http%3A%2F%2Fgetbetterhealth.com%2Fbudget-cuts-and-their-potential-complications-for-family-medicine%2F2011.07.16 Every day in the news, you hear about the United States federal budget and the potential political complications if something is done or if nothing is done. And every day in the news you hear about possible cuts in Medicare. What you don’t know is that some cuts in Medicare can significantly impact the training of future Family Physicians. What do I mean by this? Well, did you know that residency programs are paid Medicare funds (called Graduate Medical Education funds) going to hospitals? Check out this great article about how residency programs are funded. So, let’s play this out with its potential complications for Family Medicine. If GME funds are cut as they are proposed, then many hospitals with only one residency program (usually a Family Medicine program), may be forced... Better Health blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5036234 Sat, 16 Jul 2011 16:00:45 +0100 5036234 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5036219&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F-sTuIxycJF0%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: People here in Washington are now considering military spending cuts that they thought strategically unwise and politically impossible just a few years ago. And conservatives are joining in. Federally funded spaceflight is the quintessential neoconservative project: a giant, wasteful crusade designed to fill Americans’ supposedly empty lives with meaning. The Obama administration wants to send bureaucrats from federal agencies that are notorious for wasting other people’s money to help local bureaucrats do a more “efficient” job of spending other people’s money. President Obama’s Fiscal Commission handed Republicans ready-made spending cuts on a silver platter — R... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5036219 Fri, 15 Jul 2011 20:06:46 +0100 5036219 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5036220&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FVKuTAMhLV_c%2F By Daniel J. MitchellIn my speeches, especially when talking about the fiscal crisis in Europe (or the future fiscal crisis in America), I often warn that the welfare state reaches a point of no return when the people riding in the welfare wagon begins to outnumber the people pulling the wagon. To be more specific, if more than 50 percent of the population is dependent on government (employed in the bureaucracy, living off welfare, receiving public pensions, etc.), it becomes difficult for taxpayers to form a majority coalition to fix the mess. This may explain why Greek politicians have resisted significant reforms, even though the nation faces a fiscal death spiral. But you don’t need me to explain this relationship. One of our Cato interns, Silvia Morandotti, used her artistic sk... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5036220 Fri, 15 Jul 2011 16:02:43 +0100 5036220 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5036221&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FyrSfYHrRWHI%2F By Chris EdwardsCharles Krauthammer is absolutely right that Republicans must call President Obama’s bluff on the debt-limit vote. I suggested that the House GOP pass $2 trillion in cuts tied to a $2 trillion debt increase, thus handing the matter over to the Senate and the president and refusing to budge. Krauthammer has the same idea, but with $500 billion in cuts and a $500 billion debt increase. That would certainly be better than Senator McConnell’s chicken-out plan, and it would have the advantage of being so modest in size that I think it would ultimately get large support in the Senate from moderates. The cuts–small “trims” really–could be taken right from Obama’s own Fiscal Commission report. The table below illustrates how modest and ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5036221 Fri, 15 Jul 2011 15:34:46 +0100 5036221 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5028142&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FeqERmfPy4Hk%2F By Daniel J. MitchellThe United States has been on a decade-long spending binge. Thanks to the profligate policies of both Bush and Obama, the burden of federal spending has climbed to about 25 percent of economic output, up from 18.2 percent of GDP when Bill Clinton left office. The political class tells us that more government is good for the economy since it an “investment” and/or a “stimulus.” The academic research, however, tells a different story. Here are some brief excerpts from a recent study by two Swedish economists, including a critically important observation about the impact of bigger government on economic performance. …most recent studies typically find a negative correlation between total government size and economic growth. …the most co... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5028142 Thu, 14 Jul 2011 13:36:25 +0100 5028142 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5028148&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fz1Zx0QAvbHM%2F By Daniel J. MitchellThere are three reasons why I’m not very hopeful about the outcome of the debt-limit battle. 1. There is no unity in the GOP camp. Republicans have been all over the map during this fight. Some of them want a balanced budget amendment. Some want a one-for-one deal of $2 trillion of spending cuts in exchange for a $2 trillion increase in the debt limit. Others want some sort of spending cap, akin to Senator Corker’s CAP Act. Some want to mix all these ideas together in a cut-cap-balance package. Others want Obamacare repeal.  And the latest proposal is Sen. McConnell’s proposal to let Obama unilaterally raise the debt limit. These are mostly good ideas, but the failure to coalesce around one proposal – preferably one that is easy to understand – has made the ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5028148 Wed, 13 Jul 2011 15:00:25 +0100 5028148 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5028149&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fy3jgVAHhD_M%2F By Michael F. CannonA non-statist would never write something like this: We had a big surplus. It was time to do something with it. Brad DeLong, a former Clinton administration official and an economist at the University of California at Berkeley, didn’t want to see the surplus spent on tax cuts. He wanted to see it spent on public investments. To a statist, all resources belong to the state.  The government doesn’t tax 40 percent of your earnings; it magnanimously spends the other 60 percent on you.  When the government reduces your taxes, it isn’t taking less money from you; it’s spending more of its money on you. The above quote comes from an article titled, “We Have a Taxing Problem, Not Just a Spending Problem.”  But since statists believe that not tax... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5028149 Wed, 13 Jul 2011 14:52:12 +0100 5028149 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5028153&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F2BZuoMHpplg%2F By Chris EdwardsSenate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has offered the president a way to raise the debt ceiling by $2.5 trillion without having to cut spending. The WaPo reports that “McConnell’s strategy makes no provision for spending cuts to be enacted.” This appears to be an epic cave-in and completely at odds with McConnell’s own pronouncements in recent months that major budget reforms must be tied to any debt-limit increase. House Republicans should obviously reject McConnell’s surrender, and they should do what they should have done months ago. They should put together a package of $2 trillion in real spending cuts taken straight from the Obama fiscal commission report and pass it through the House tied to a debt-limit increase of $2 trillion. Then they shouldn’t budge... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5028153 Wed, 13 Jul 2011 14:37:47 +0100 5028153 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5028155&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FHyem7SCcShk%2F By Tad DeHavenWhen government officials come up with what they claim to be a wonderful new idea, I often think of an old Saturday Night Live skit from 1990 poking fun at commercials for blue jeans. The skit’s scene is a group of middle-aged buddies getting ready to play basketball in their new “Bad Idea Jeans.” Each guy optimistically announces a plan to do something that is actually a “bad idea.” For example, a character says “I don’t know the guy but I’ve got two kidneys and he needs one, so I figured…” and “BAD IDEA” flashes across the screen. (The skit can be watched here.) The White House’s new “Strong Cities, Strong Communities” initiative had that BAD IDEA screen shot flashing repeatedly in my mind as I read the press release: Today, the Obama Administr... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5028155 Tue, 12 Jul 2011 21:00:05 +0100 5028155 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5008134&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FiMKGbSr6JdU%2F By Chris EdwardsThe new issue of Mid-Atlantic Brewing News has a nice article about the District of Columbia’s laissez-faire rules for beer distribution. (See page 8 in the “digital edition“). Columnist George Rivers explains that the D.C. rules encourage entrepreneurship, bring jobs and economic activity to the city, and are a big plus for consumers: While most jurisdictions in the U.S. erect regulatory barriers to limit the sale and consumption of alcohol, DC’s legal framework encourages retailers and wholesalers to compete for consumers’ dollars through increased selection and lower prices. Rivers notes that beer consumers flee Maryland’s red tape and higher tax burden to enjoy the lower prices in D.C. At the same time, entrepreneurial beer retailer... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5008134 Fri, 08 Jul 2011 14:42:22 +0100 5008134 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5008147&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FFLm7kkThP6Y%2F By Daniel J. MitchellThe President has issued an ultimatum that more tax revenue must be part of budget negotiations. Indeed, he endlessly repeats his desire for a “balanced approach,” implying that as much as 50 percent of the deficit reduction in any agreement should come from higher revenues. Because I am a thoughtful, middle-of-the-road, pragmatic guy, I’m willing to accept the President’s ultimatum. I do have one tiny request, however, and that is for any such deal to be based on honest math. What I mean by this is that I don’t want politicians to approve a budget that results in more spending, but then claim that they “cut spending” because the budget didn’t grow even faster. I want a spending cut to mean less spending (gee, what a novel idea). And when they talk abou... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5008147 Wed, 06 Jul 2011 19:57:21 +0100 5008147 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5008151&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FUlt5Mbl677w%2F By Tad DeHavenA new video produced by Cato’s Caleb Brown and Austin Bragg does a typically stellar job of visualizing the alleged $2 trillion in spending cuts currently being negotiated on Capitol Hill as part of a deal to raise the debt ceiling. The video is based on my recent chart, which shows that $2 trillion in cuts over ten years is relatively small considering that the federal government is projected to spend almost $46 trillion over that same time frame. Indeed, rather than actually cutting spending, federal spending (and debt) would continue to grow – just at a slightly lower rate. The video also highlights Chris Edwards’ concern that the cuts will be phony: instead of actual terminations in programs or reductions in entitlements, there is a strong possibility that budg... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5008151 Wed, 06 Jul 2011 17:50:24 +0100 5008151 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5008155&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FZM20phiwWic%2F By Daniel J. MitchellI’m not a big fan of the rating agencies. I’ve warned in TV interviews that they generally wait too long before downgrading profligate governments. So when the rating agencies finally catch up to everyone else and lower their outlook for failing welfare states such as Greece and Portugal, one would think that this would be seen as a useful – albeit late – warning sign. But European politicians are not very happy about this development. At the risk of mixing metaphors, they want everyone to keep their heads buried in the sand and to continue complimenting the emperor on his new clothes. Here are some excerpts from a BBC report. The European Commission has strongly criticised international credit ratings agencies following the downgrade of Portugal by Moody�... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5008155 Wed, 06 Jul 2011 14:29:15 +0100 5008155 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=5008156&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FN9ikAKor7fY%2F By Neal McCluskeyInside Higher Ed today released the results of a very telling survey of college business officers. From IHE’s article on the survey: About one in six business officers at both public and private nonprofit colleges described the financial health of their respective institutions as “excellent,” and another 57 percent of public-college CFOs and 47 percent of private-college CFOs characterized their respective institutions’ financial health as “good.” That’s right: Despite the continuing negative effects of our economic malaise, the financial sky is not crashing down on the Ivory Tower — far from it! Perhaps most interesting is this quote from Kent John Chabotar, president of Guilford College and a former CFO at Bowdoin College: Many of my financia... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=5008156 Wed, 06 Jul 2011 14:24:25 +0100 5008156 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4992650&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FIt6jNJaNGKk%2F By David BoazIn the apparent belief that the Tea Party movement and Americans’ general aversion to higher taxes are conjured out of thin air by master manipulator Grover Norquist, Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick offers this devastating riposte to Norquist’s support for limited government: I remember sitting in the Dunster House dining hall at Harvard with Norquist when we were sophomores or juniors in college, while he explained his view of government, or lack thereof. It sounded logical — the notion that we could live independently of each other, making our own decisions in our own self-interest. But then who puts out the fires? Who answers the calls to 911? Who educates poor children? Who helps people with disabilities? Good point. And we could go on. Without governmen... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4992650 Sat, 02 Jul 2011 14:50:08 +0100 4992650 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4992651&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FW6DczCX0cHc%2F By Chris EdwardsOver at the Daily Caller, I provide a primer on why government spending doesn’t “stimulate” the economy over the short-run or the long-run. I look at the huge size of government spending in the United States, and I review the effects of recent stimulus efforts. Then I describe the government’s “leaky bucket,” which explains why spending harms the economy in the long run, whether or not there are any short-run stimulus effects. With America heading rapidly toward a spending-fueled debt crisis, these certainly are the times the try men’s souls. Nonetheless, please have a Happy Fourth! Government Spending Isn’t Working is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4992651 Fri, 01 Jul 2011 20:17:22 +0100 4992651 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4992655&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FxEO8B7rjBn8%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: As Congress scours the budget looking for spending cuts, federal employment and training programs would be good targets. If Republican and Democratic lawmakers were really discussing major spending cuts, then the media would be full of stories mentioning particular changes to entitlement laws to reduce benefits and stories about abolishing programs widely regarded as wasteful, such as community development grants. Indexing the tax code to the chained Consumer Price Index = stealth tax increase. Putting $2 trillion in spending cuts in perspective. Not only is individual financial literacy not an appropriate concern of the federal government, but the federal government itself is a mo... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4992655 Fri, 01 Jul 2011 16:48:51 +0100 4992655 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4992662&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FaF-AQlQNX1Y%2F By Daniel J. MitchellFor both political and policy reasons, the left is desperately trying to maneuver Republicans into going along with a tax increase. And they are smart to make this their top goal. After all, it will be very difficult – if not impossible – to increase the burden of government spending without more revenue coming to Washington. But how to make this happen? President Obama is mostly arguing in favor of class-warfare tax increases, but that’s a non-serious gambit driven by 2012 political considerations. Moreover, there’s presumably zero chance that Republicans would surrender to higher tax rates on work, saving, and investment. The real threat is back-door hikes resulting from the elimination and/or reduction of so-called tax breaks. The big spenders on the left a... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4992662 Fri, 01 Jul 2011 02:12:15 +0100 4992662 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4992665&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FtFB6CH_fkyo%2F By Tad DeHavenAlmost 600 pages into the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act is a provision directing the Government Accountability Office to assess the feasibility of the federal government certifying organizations that provide financial literacy. The GAO released its report this week and concluded that “While a federal process for certifying financial literacy providers appears to be feasible, doing so would pose challenges.” The challenges cited by the GAO are generally of the bureaucratic variety: What agency or agencies would be in charge? What criteria would be used? How would oversight be conducted? And most importantly, how much would it cost [taxpayers] to implement and operate a federal process for certifying financial literacy providers? Fortunately... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4992665 Thu, 30 Jun 2011 19:17:43 +0100 4992665 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4984418&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fm1zNfWgRfVE%2F By Mark A. CalabriaPerhaps this is best thought of as the chart of the day, as I will not attempt to discuss its many implications or drivers.  The following chart tracks the percentage of federal spending that is simply a direct transfer of income.  Now we could debate whether all government spending is little more than a transfer of wealth, but let’s save that for another day.  The chart shows a dramatic increase in the share of government that does not go to buying or producing anything, but simply takes the form of a check, increasing from around a third of federal spending to about two-thirds today. There is one aspect of this trend which merits study in our current economic environment.  While there is a wide range of estimates* for how much government spending adds (or su... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4984418 Thu, 30 Jun 2011 16:05:44 +0100 4984418 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4984421&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F2xbpOrm84Pw%2F By Jim HarperThe Los Angeles Times has a good article on California’s move to require Amazon and other out-of-state retailers to collect taxes for it. Good because it accurately portrays what’s happening. Many such stories will say that California is seeking to tax Amazon. In fact, says the headline, “California Tells Online Retailers to Start Collecting Sales Taxes From Customers.” You see, Californians generally don’t pay their “use taxes“—the alternative to sales taxes, for things brought into the state from outside. If the tax authorities tried to collect use taxes, going door to door to tally up the goods that haven’t yet been taxed, there would be bedlam. So they want out-of-state companies that sell into California to collect the... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4984421 Thu, 30 Jun 2011 13:42:27 +0100 4984421 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4984422&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FgrDzfzJqs_M%2F By Tad DeHavenCongressional Republicans have said that spending cuts must be at least as large as an increase in the debt ceiling. Negotiations over lifting the debt ceiling are ongoing, but the “magic number,” so-to-speak, would be around $2 trillion in spending cuts. Cutting $2 trillion in federal spending sounds like a lot, but it’s actually relatively small because the cuts would likely occur over ten years. According to the Congressional Budget Office’s most recent budget baseline, the federal government will spend almost $46 trillion over the next ten years. The following chart shows what $2 trillion in spending cuts over the next ten years looks like when measured against the CBO’s baseline. Even with the cuts, federal spending would still increase by $1.8 trillion: Rathe... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4984422 Wed, 29 Jun 2011 19:23:20 +0100 4984422 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4975825&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fs2-Usb210eI%2F By Sallie JamesSen. Max Baucus (D-MT), chairman of the Senate Finance Committee,  Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, and the White House have just announced that they have made a deal to extend Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA, the program that extends extra unemployment and health care benefits to workers who lose their jobs because of globalization) until 2013, as part of a broader deal that would see passage of the three outstanding preferential trade agreements with Korea, Colombia, and Panama. The extension of TAA would be included in the legislation to implement the US-Korea Free Trade Agreement, “improved” (i.e., made less liberalizing) by the administration in December. Interestingly and alarmingly, because implementing the FTAs... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4975825 Tue, 28 Jun 2011 21:17:38 +0100 4975825 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4975826&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F5lkzgVd7Tog%2F By Chris EdwardsAs we close in on congressional votes to increase the federal debt limit, negotiators are coming up with all kinds of ideas to hike taxes. (Suspiciously, they haven’t revealed very many spending cut ideas so far). One idea being discussed is to raise revenue by reducing the indexing of parameters in the income tax code. Currently, tax brackets and other features of the tax code are indexed to the Consumer Price Index (CPI). It is widely recognized that the CPI overestimates inflation for various reasons, as discussed here. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has developed a more accurate (and lower) measure of inflation, called chained CPI. If the tax code was indexed to chained CPI instead of CPI, the government would receive an automatic tax increase relative to cu... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4975826 Tue, 28 Jun 2011 18:35:34 +0100 4975826 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4975830&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F5wSlBN3174w%2F By Daniel J. MitchellIt appears that American taxpayers are about to subsidize another Greek bailout (via the Keystone Cops at the IMF). This is way beyond economically foolish. It is also morally offensive. To turn Winston Churchill’s famous quote upside down, “Never have so many paid so much to subsidize such an undeserving few.” Let’s start with a few facts: Greece’s GDP is roughly equal to the GDP of Maryland. Greece’s population is roughly equal to the population of Ohio. Despite that small size, in both terms of population and economic output, Greece already has received a bailout of about $150 billion (actual amount fluctuates with the exchange rate). Don’t forget the indirect bailout resulting from purchases of Greek government bonds by the European Central Bank. No... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4975830 Tue, 28 Jun 2011 15:11:00 +0100 4975830 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4975841&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fm_tMpvIn4JY%2F By Daniel J. MitchellThis new video, based in large part on the good work of Michael Cannon, explains why Medicaid should be shifted to the states. As I note in the title of this post, it’s good federalism policy and good fiscal policy. But the video also explains that Medicaid reform is good health policy since it creates an opportunity to deal with the third-party payer problem. One of the key observations of the video is that Medicaid block grants would replicate the success of welfare reform. Getting rid of the federal welfare entitlement in the 1990s and shifting the program to the states was a very successful policy, saving billions of dollars for taxpayers and significantly reducing poverty. There is every reason to think ending the Medicaid entitlement will have similar positive... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4975841 Mon, 27 Jun 2011 14:55:48 +0100 4975841 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4975846&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FI7c-rTbplTw%2F By Chris EdwardsIn the Washington Post Friday, Ezra Klein partly confirmed what I fear the Republican strategy is for the debt-limit bill—get to the $2 trillion in cuts promised through accounting gimmicks. As I have also noted, Klein says that there is about $1 trillion in budget “savings” ($1.4 trillion with interest) to be found simply in the inflated Congressional Budget Office baseline for Iraq and Afghanistan. Klein says, “I’m told that a big chunk of these savings were included in the debt-ceiling deal” that Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) and Sen. Jon Kyl (D-AZ) are negotiating with the Democrats. Republican leaders have promised that spending cuts in the debt-limit deal must be at least as large as the debt-limit increase, which means $2 trillion if the debt-limit is extended ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4975846 Mon, 27 Jun 2011 12:52:43 +0100 4975846 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4968454&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F7MfQLX26LBU%2F By David BoazBack in the day (February 2008), a senator named Barack Obama said, “I opposed this [Iraq] war in 2002. I will bring this war to an end in 2009. It is time to bring our troops home.” The following month, under fire from Hillary Clinton, he reiterated, ”I was opposed to this war in 2002. . . . I have been against it in 2002, 2003, 2004, 5, 6, 7, 8 and I will bring this war to an end in 2009. So don’t be confused.” Indeed, in his famous “the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow” speech on the night he clinched the Democratic nomination, he also proclaimed, “I am absolutely certain that generations from now we will be able to look back and tell our children that . . . this was the moment when we ended a war.” So now the Congressional Budget Of... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4968454 Sat, 25 Jun 2011 21:49:05 +0100 4968454 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4968493&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=39187&url=http%3A%2F%2Fgetbetterhealth.com%2Fcan-crime-be-linked-to-cuts-in-the-mental-health-budget%2F2011.06.25 From the New York Times today we have a story entitled, “A Schizophrenic, A Slain Worker, Troubling Questions,” a horrible story about a mentally ill man who killed a social worker in his group home. The story highlights the defendant’s longstanding history of violence with several assaults in his past. He once fractured his stepfather’s skull and his first criminal offense involved slashing and robbing a homeless man. (On another post on this blog Rob wondered why the charges were dismissed in that case; from experience I can tell you it’s probably because the victim and only witness was homeless and couldn’t be located several months later when the defendant came to trial.) The defendant, Deshawn Chappell, also used drugs while suffering from schizophr... Better Health blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4968493 Sat, 25 Jun 2011 12:00:00 +0100 4968493 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4968457&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FUfDSmUpefsU%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: On the National Labor Relations Board’s recent meddling: The idea that a small regulatory board in D.C. should try to centrally plan $1 billion of private business investment is crackers. After finally being booted from office in November, ex-Rep. Jim Oberstar reemerges to voice his support for reauthorizing the Economic Development Administration. The EDA should be booted too. The numbers in the Congressional Budget Office’s latest long-term budget forecast are new but the message is the same: the budget is on an unsustainable path. The CBO’s projections show that the long-term debt problem is not a balanced one—it is caused by historic increases in spending,... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4968457 Fri, 24 Jun 2011 18:42:26 +0100 4968457 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4968458&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FAlR60aAkYlI%2F By Jim HarperI nearly dropped my sugar bowl in my Froot Loops this morning when I saw that Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) had introduced a bill to provide a temporary tax credit to firms hiring previously unemployed workers. IANAE (I am not an economist), but even I know that if you drop the cost of hiring workers, you will get a few more workers hired until the cost of employing them rises again. The net result, after the tax credit expires, would be a return to unemployment for an equivalent number of workers. Sure, letting businesses keep a bit more of the money they earn would provide a small stimulative effect, but that too would expire, and it’s nothing like the strengthening you’d get from a permanent tax reduction under which planning and investment could be based on... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4968458 Fri, 24 Jun 2011 17:52:32 +0100 4968458 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4968467&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F5jTEQkTifSc%2F By Tad DeHavenI recently testified before the Senate Small Business Committee on the topic of the Small Business Administration. GovExec.com mentioned that there was a “bit of drama as the hearing ended” when Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) “upbraided” me for comments I had made in an exchange with Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY). Having watched a recording of the hearing, I think I should comment. Proponents of the SBA argue that a “market failure” exists because some otherwise worthy applicants are unduly denied credit under the standard criteria used by private lenders. Therefore, the federal government should correct this alleged “failure” by incentivizing private lenders to issue loans to less credit-worthy applicants. The SBA does this by “guaranteeing” up to 85 percent of the loan... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4968467 Thu, 23 Jun 2011 20:55:44 +0100 4968467 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4968470&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fzi2qAyxyu4s%2F By Chris EdwardsNew projections from the Congressional Budget Office show that without reforms rising federal spending will fundamental reshape America’s economy, and not in a good way. Under the CBO’s “alternative fiscal scenario,” the federal government will consume an 86 percent greater share of the economy in 2035 than it did a decade ago (33.9 percent of GDP compared to 18.2 percent). The CBO report and many centrist budget wonks focus more on the problem of rising federal debt than on rising spending. As a result, many wonks clamor for a “balanced” package of spending cuts and tax increases to solve our fiscal problems. But CBO projections show that the long-term debt problem is not a balanced one—it is caused by historic increases in spending, not shortages of revenues... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4968470 Thu, 23 Jun 2011 16:20:12 +0100 4968470 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4960039&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FMwSOG5P2eGc%2F By Tad DeHavenThe Congressional Budget Office released the latest edition of its annual forecast of where the federal government’s budget is headed. The numbers are new but the message is the same: the budget is on an unsustainable path. According to the CBO’s more politically-realistic “alternative scenario,” federal debt as a share of GDP will hit 109 percent in 2021 and would approach 190 percent in 2035. For those mistaken souls who believe that merely eliminating “waste, fraud, and abuse” in government programs can solve the problem, the CBO has news for you: In the Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO’s) long-term projections of spending, growth in noninterest spending as a share of gross domestic product (GDP) is attributable entirely to increases in spending on severa... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4960039 Wed, 22 Jun 2011 20:39:09 +0100 4960039 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4960043&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FCoYuX5FPRRM%2F Conclusion is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4960043 Wed, 22 Jun 2011 15:07:17 +0100 4960043 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4960047&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FOYManO2E-iw%2F By David BoazFive years ago this week I noted that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, in a tip of the hat to Frederic Bastiat, had literally endorsed a candlemakers’ petition to the federal government to protect them against overseas competition. I was reminded of that today when I read that Rep. Michele Bachmann literally thanked the federal government for its purchase of pork from Minnesota farmers: On Oct. 5, 2009, Bachmann wrote Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack praising him for injecting money into the pork industry through the form of direct government purchases. She went on to request additional assistance. “Your efforts to stabilize prices through direct government purchasing of pork and dairy products are very much welcomed by the producers in Minnesota, and I would encourag... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4960047 Wed, 22 Jun 2011 14:49:37 +0100 4960047 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4952788&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FtwsZfSvdo9c%2F By Tad DeHavenWhen Rep. Jim Oberstar (D-MN) lost his bid for reelection in November, it brought to an end a congressional career that spanned nearly a half century. As a former chairman of the House Transportation Committee, Oberstar’s faith in the ability of the federal government to turn taxpayer water into wine was typical for a politician ensconced in the Washington Beltway bubble. Oberstar reemerged this week to voice his support for legislation reauthorizing the Economic Development Administration, which is still being debated on the Senate floor. In an op-ed written for The Hill, Oberstar says that “It is disheartening to see that the agency I helped create more than 45 years ago which has had constant bipartisan support is now under unwarranted partisan attack in an economic en... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4952788 Tue, 21 Jun 2011 20:38:27 +0100 4952788 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4952793&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FDGqSypCChvo%2F By Mark A. CalabriaI almost hesitate to suggest that anyone actually read Alan Blinder’s defense of Keynesian economics in today’s Wall Street Journal, except that the piece lays out clearly in my mind why Blinder is so wrong.  The only part you really need to read is: In sum, you may view any particular public-spending program as wasteful, inefficient, leading to “big government” or objectionable on some other grounds. But if it’s not financed with higher taxes, and if it doesn’t drive up interest rates, it’s hard to see how it can destroy jobs. So in Blinder’s world, deficits are explicitly not future taxes, despite what I believe is a fairly strong consensus among economists that some form of Ricardian equivalence holds (see John Seater&#... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4952793 Tue, 21 Jun 2011 16:40:22 +0100 4952793 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4952797&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FczovuTGcLYA%2F By Alan ReynoldsRobert Reich posted a letter in June 20 Wall Street Journal responding to my article of June 16, “Why 70% Tax Rates Won’t Work.” He argues that I distort his proposal (though I wasn’t talking about his proposal) and ignore his argument that, “Giving the middle class more purchasing power by lowering its rates while raising the rates at the top will help spur [economic] growth.” This strikes me as a futile effort to change the subject.  Since I proved that past tax rates of 50-70% on relatively modest incomes raised less revenue than a top tax rate of 28%, how could Reich’s proposal of 50-70% rates at incomes above $500,000 raise more revenue?   And if 50-70% tax rates would not raise more revenue, then how could he possibly promise “substantial rate ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4952797 Mon, 20 Jun 2011 21:05:45 +0100 4952797 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4952804&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F04p9GU35RGM%2F By Daniel J. MitchellOne of the tax increases buried in Obamacare was an onerous and intrusive “1099″ scheme that would have required businesses to collect tax identification numbers for just about any vendor and then send paperwork to the IRS whenever they did more than $600 of business. Send one of your sales people to New York for a couple of nights? They would have to get the tax ID for the hotel and submit a form to the IRS. Buy a printer for the office? The printer company would need to provide a tax ID and the purchaser would have to submit a form to the IRS. o Have a retirement dinner for somebody in the accounting department? Get the restaurant’s tax ID and submit another form to the IRS. This system was seen as a nightmare, even leading to rather amusing cartoons mocking ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4952804 Mon, 20 Jun 2011 15:55:16 +0100 4952804 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4953389&cid=t_101646_155_f&fid=39053&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcommunity.advanceweb.com%2Fblogs%2Fal_2%2Farchive%2F2011%2F06%2F20%2Fsavings-the-name-of-the-game.aspx By now I hope you’ve read our recent online articles, “ Enhance Revenue With Electronic Ordering ” and “ Blood Bank Instrumentation Purchases ” to get a feel for how efficiency and streamlining measures play off big for savings in the lab. We continue...(read more) (Source: ADVANCE Discourse: Lab) ADVANCE Discourse: Lab blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4953389 Mon, 20 Jun 2011 14:37:00 +0100 4953389 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4952808&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fb12NOQoBHsE%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this past week: The threat of terrorism is so low in the United States and the efficacy of the funds in mitigating it so uncertain that the right amount of homeland security spending in most parts of the United States is none. With trillion dollar deficits and mounting federal debt, will Congress finally get serious about cutting farm subsidies? Sen. Jim DeMint cites Cato’s Downsizing Government work in a Wall Street Journal op-ed on the Economic Development Administration. Chris Edwards on a debt limit deal: Will the cuts be phony? I told the Senate Small Business Committee that the Small Business Administration should be abolished. Follow Downsizing the Federal Government on Twitter (@Down... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4952808 Mon, 20 Jun 2011 00:41:19 +0100 4952808 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4934107&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F9OkYj3oryb8%2F By Daniel J. MitchellI’ve explained before that one of the most damning pieces of evidence against Obamanomics is that the economy is suffering from sub-par growth, something that is particularly damning since normally one expects to see faster-than-average growth following an economic downturn. In a recent presentation, Robert Lucas of the University of Chicago included a couple of graphs that illustrate this phenomenon. This first chart shows the history of U.S. economic growth over the past 140 years. As you can see, the growth rate was remarkably constant over time, and there were always periods of rapid growth following economic downturns. Lucas, who won the Nobel Prize in economics in 1995, then looks at the data for the recent downturn and recovery. As you can see, we have been s... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4934107 Thu, 16 Jun 2011 12:43:32 +0100 4934107 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4934109&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FXc7k-_at7S8%2F By Tad DeHavenLast week, I wrote about reauthorization of the Economic Development Administration, which is currently being debated on the Senate floor. Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) wrote an op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal that cites Cato’s work on the EDA. DeMint correctly notes that the mistaken rationale behind the EDA’s creation during the Great Society is the same as the Obama administration’s $814 billion stimulus bill: government programs can solve economic problems. Instead, both have been massive wastes of taxpayer money. After doing an able job of listing some of the EDA’s faults — and acknowledging that he was wrong to have supported the program in the past — DeMint concludes that members of Congress should be “actively finding ways to reduce spending” given t... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4934109 Wed, 15 Jun 2011 17:24:20 +0100 4934109 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4921386&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FcLLTPo1HjH8%2F By Tad DeHavenOver at Downsizing the Federal Government, we focused on the following issues this week: If we are ever to get our budgetary house in order by limiting the size and scope of government, central planning bureaucracies like the Economic Development Administration have to (finally) go. Firefighting is a purely local concern and should be funded by those who benefit from a local fire department’s services — not federal taxpayers. House Republicans say that they will not support a debt increase unless the Democrats agree to equal-sized spending cuts. The crucial question is: Will the proposed budget savings be real cuts or smoke-and-mirrors “cuts”? The U.S. Postal Service’s problems: the response thus far from Congress couldn’t be more typical: a c... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4921386 Fri, 10 Jun 2011 17:31:20 +0100 4921386 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4921390&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FVVOUecP7aPc%2F By Mark A. CalabriaThe standard Keynesian policy proposal for a weak economy is to have the government spend more money, and run deficits to do so.  Clearly much of current government spending is being financed by borrowing.  So current conditions are not subject to the New Deal critique that it was mostly paid for by taxes, as during the Great Depression. Current federal expenditures have increased about 41% since the housing market peaked in 2006.  Has all this government spending generated many jobs?  While keeping in mind that correlation is not the same as causality, it is interesting that the trend in government spending and total non-farm employees mirror one another, but not in the way you’d like.  The more the government has spent, the more people have lost their jobs... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4921390 Thu, 09 Jun 2011 20:35:37 +0100 4921390 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4921393&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FPTxrRugA624%2F By Tad DeHavenThe Department of Labor has been added to Cato’s Downsizing Government website. Proposed spending cuts are $143 billion. The following essays examine the department’s activities: Failures of Unemployment Insurance. The UI system is costly to taxpayers and creates numerous economic distortions. Federal involvement should be ended and the states left free to design their own systems. Employment and Training Programs. Federal programs for unemployed workers have never worked very well, are relatively little used, and are unneeded in today’s economy because private markets provide many alternatives. Reforming Labor Union Laws. Federal union laws that mandate exclusive representation, union security, and prevailing wages are costly to the economy and restrict indivi... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4921393 Thu, 09 Jun 2011 17:17:19 +0100 4921393 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4911464&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FYbQmO1Im2Eg%2F By Tad DeHavenLast week, the House passed a $40.6 billion Homeland Security appropriations bill for fiscal 2012. The Constitutional Authority Statement for the bill cited Congress’s authority to appropriate money and the General Welfare Clause. Citing the General Welfare Clause might be appropriate for activities associated with the common defense of the nation. However, it is not an appropriate justification for something like the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Assistance to Firefighters Grant program, which distributes federal taxpayer money to local fire departments. Firefighting is a purely local concern and should be funded by those who benefit from a local fire department’s services. Why in the world am I paying federal taxes in Pennsylvania to a bureaucracy in Washingto... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4911464 Tue, 07 Jun 2011 12:40:45 +0100 4911464 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4902403&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F6qgsLdBMxrU%2F By Tad DeHavenThe Senate is set to take up legislation reauthorizing the Department of Commerce’s Economic Development Administration. A relic of the Great Society, the EDA was created to help economically depressed areas of the country. Today it’s just another example of an unnecessary, unconstitutional program that lingers around because politicians like to demonstrate to the public that they’re “doing something.” Politicians also like to present oversized U.S. Treasury checks to constituents. The EDA’s forerunner was the Area Redevelopment Administration created by Congress in 1961. Sen. John McClellan (D-AK) presciently warned at the time: “if we ever begin permitting the government to enter into one area, one community, and foot the entire cost of a project, then we shal... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4902403 Mon, 06 Jun 2011 19:47:00 +0100 4902403 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4902407&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FFRHnZbQler4%2F By David BoazAt the Britannica Blog I note Sarah Palin’s misstatement about President Obama’s record on the national debt, and then ask whether that’s the real problem: Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann have both said in recent days that, as Palin put it, ”Look at the debt that has been accumulated in the last two years. It’s more debt under this president than all those other presidents combined.” And they’ve both been rapped by journalistic fact-checkers…. So what’s the real problem here? Is it Bachmann’s and Palin’s exaggeration of Obama’s record on deficits and debt? Or is it President Obama’s unsustainable spending? Obama’s Spending and Palin’s Stumbling is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-libert... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4902407 Mon, 06 Jun 2011 15:09:02 +0100 4902407 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4902409&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F3jcb9WgcdV4%2F By Tom G. PalmerIt reminds us of the need to repeat, and repeat, and repeat the same messages.  Tornadoes, diseases, and wars are not good for “the economy.”  They may be good for hardware stores, doctors, and military contractors, but not for the rest of us.  Still, the New York Times couldn’t help but tell us on the front page that “Reconstruction Lifts Economy After Disasters.” Frederic Bastiat exploded the fallacy long ago.  Here’s a modern (and shorter) retelling: Broken Windows All Over is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4902409 Mon, 06 Jun 2011 12:36:28 +0100 4902409 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4893394&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FXw54OiQpX0Y%2F By Tad DeHavenA fierce storm from Mother Nature killed my Internet connection last Friday (I didn’t see any black helicopters, so I’m assuming it was her). Therefore, the following are issues we focused on over the last two weeks at Downsizing the Federal Government: Federal employees enjoy benefits that aren’t available to most private sector workers. A bottom-up approach to transportation policy would save taxpayers money and increase mobility. Trims to discretionary agriculture programs leads one congressman to channel his inner Harold Camping. Education policy: the Obama administration wants a race to the cradle. Only six other Republicans voted for Sen. Rand Paul’s plan to balance the budget in five years through spending cuts. Two key House Republicans want to ha... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4893394 Fri, 03 Jun 2011 16:09:45 +0100 4893394 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4893398&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FhSJTt3QDCdA%2F By Daniel J. MitchellBased on this morning’s numbers, I’ve updated my chart showing what the Obama Administration said would happen with the so-called stimulus compared to what actually has happened. As you can see, the unemployment rate is about 2.5 percentage points higher than the White House claimed it would be at this point. Since I just did an I-told-you-so post about Greece, I may as well pat myself on the back again (albeit for another completely obvious prediction). Here’s the video I narrated a couple of years ago on the Obama faux stimulus. Heckuva Job on that Stimulus! is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4893398 Fri, 03 Jun 2011 15:10:39 +0100 4893398 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4893407&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FuczY8ZO9Tq4%2F By Caleb O. BrownAs Justin Logan puts it, we borrow money from China to make precision-guided munitions which we then give to the Europeans so they can drop them on Libya. This is a product of U.S. involvement in NATO. In this new video, Christopher A. Preble, Benjamin H. Friedman and Justin Logan provide analysis about our involvement in NATO with specific respect to the Libya campaign. Read more of Cato’s work on NATO. Get Out of Libya, Get Out of NATO is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4893407 Thu, 02 Jun 2011 17:19:38 +0100 4893407 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4893412&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FhYNofFwwjrM%2F By George Scoville Few GOP presidential candidates have proposed specific budget cuts. “Peace is in the interest of Taiwan, China, and the U.S. … But the U.S. should view continuing arms sales to Taipei as perhaps the best means to maintain stability and peace across the Taiwan Strait.” Market liberalization has transformed newly independent states that formerly comprised Yugoslavia. President Obama is simply the new standard-bearer for the bipartisan contempt for constitutional limits on power. Cato chairman Robert A. Levy makes the libertarian case for marriage equality: Thursday Links is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4893412 Thu, 02 Jun 2011 15:08:11 +0100 4893412 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4893415&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FyrejsaU4zQo%2F By Neal McCluskeyThe hotly anticipated — and dreaded — “gainful employment” regulations aimed at for-profit colleges were released this morning, and based on media reports the big news is that they are a little more lenient than originally expected. Most importantly, schools that fail to meet debt-to-income and debt-repayment requirements will not be cut off from federal student aid — the financial crack on which almost every college and university depends — until 2015. That’s the big news, at least as reported. But it isn’t the important story. The real story remains that the Obama administration, and at least the education leadership in the Senate, continues to divert the public’s eye towards for-profit schools when the entire hig... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4893415 Thu, 02 Jun 2011 13:53:18 +0100 4893415 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4893417&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FD9pbEbw8h1s%2F By Sallie JamesHeartening news from the Appropriations Committee yesterday: they voted to cut aid to farmers generally, and to make significant changes to an egregious cotton program. But first, some background.  You’ll recall the embarrassing deal made by the Obama administration last year to head off Brazil’s right to impede American exports in retaliation for WTO-illegal cotton support. The United States is, in other words, now sending almost $150m worth of “technical assistance” and “capacity building” funds to Brazil, just so we can continue to subsidize American cotton growers without penalty (so much for U.S. promotion of the rule of law in international commercial relations). Rep. Ron Kind (D-WI) tried to end that deal earlier this year, but... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4893417 Thu, 02 Jun 2011 13:46:05 +0100 4893417 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4883555&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FKW1EQMnEyew%2F By Daniel J. MitchellWay back in February of 2010, I wrote that a Greek bailout would be a failure. Not surprisingly, the bureaucrats at the International Monetary Fund and the political elite from other European nations ignored my advice and gave tens of billions of dollars to Greece’s corrupt politicians. The bailout happened in part because politicians and international bureaucrats (when they’re not getting arrested for molesting hotel maids) have a compulsion to squander other people’s money. But it also should be noted that the Greek bailout was a way of indirectly bailing out the big European banks that recklessly lent money to a profligate government (as explained here). At the risk of sounding smug, let’s look at my four predictions from February 2010 and se... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4883555 Tue, 31 May 2011 20:19:10 +0100 4883555 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4883556&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F4gQD5uysK4k%2F By Tad DeHavenLast week, a motion to proceed on a budget resolution introduced by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) was decisively defeated in the Senate (7 in favor, 90 opposed). Paul’s proposal would have balanced the budget in five years (fiscal year 2016) through spending cuts and no tax increases. Social Security and Medicare would not have been altered. Instead, the proposal merely instructed relevant congressional committees to enact reforms that would achieve “solvency” over a 75-year window. That’s hardly radical. Paul’s proposed spending cuts were certainly bold by Washington’s standards, but they weren’t radical either. For example, military spending would have been cut, in part, by reducing the government’s bootprint abroad. From the Paul proposal: The ability to ut... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4883556 Tue, 31 May 2011 19:14:12 +0100 4883556 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4872064&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F2fjFJ3E65qA%2F By Trevor BurrusIn the Wall Street Journal today, Cass Sunstein—the administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs and erstwhile Harvard Law School professor—wants us to know what he and the Obama Administration are up to. In an op-ed that seems more like an advertisement (“the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, accept no substitute!”), Sunstein describes the “unprecedented government-wide review of regulations already on the books so that we can improve or remove those that are out-of-date, unnecessary, excessively burdensome or in conflict with other rules.” Sunstein discusses OSHA eliminating “1.9 million annual hours of redundant reporting burdens on employers,” the Department of Health and Human Services “reconsidering burdensome regulat... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4872064 Thu, 26 May 2011 20:40:11 +0100 4872064 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4872067&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fz-y_2tycP0U%2F By Christopher PrebleFormer Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty’s brief visit to Cato yesterday elicited some snide commentary in the blogosphere, especially this piece by the Huffington Post’s Jon Ward. Ward notes how the just-declared presidential candidate has been pretty adept at annoying audiences with his answers to questions. This one rankled the questioner, and a number of others in the auditorium. I’m not one who is going to stand before you and say we should cut the defense budget. [...] I’m not for shrinking America’s presence in the world. I’m for making sure that America remains the world leader, not becoming second or third or fourth in the list. One can sort of forgive a governor for not knowing much about foreign policy, although governors ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4872067 Thu, 26 May 2011 17:53:25 +0100 4872067 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4872069&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FgAO2XGz5Mmk%2F By Neal McCluskeyYesterday, Education Secretary Arne Duncan and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced how $700 million in new Race to the Top money will be employed: $200 million to get close-loser states in the last RTTT to once again jump through hoops and grovel before their federal overloards, and $500 million for a new “early-learning” obedience contest. The first part of this is irksome in large part because many congressional GOP members — the people who are supposed to be reining in unconstitutional, out-of-control federal adventuring — voted for the continuing resolution containing this expansion of the simultaneously worthless but dictatorial Race to the Top. The potential rewards for winning states are much smaller than the ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4872069 Thu, 26 May 2011 15:29:45 +0100 4872069 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4872072&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FvwEops27Y9w%2F By Roger PilonToday POLITICO Arena asks: How will yesterday’s largely symbolic Senate vote rejecting the Ryan FY 2012 budget plan affect the 2012 political fortunes of Republicans, especially those facing possible Tea Party-fueled primary challenges? My response: Yesterday’s Senate vote was simply an effort by Democrats to capitalize on the outcome of Tuesday’s NY-26 election. It changed nothing on the ground. Responding to that election, most congressional Republicans, far from deserting the Ryan plan, have only rallied more strongly behind it. And well they should, because there’s nothing worse in politics than disarray, as wayward moderate Republicans will likely discover in 2012. What 2010 showed was that deficits and debt are dominating our politics like n... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4872072 Thu, 26 May 2011 13:01:18 +0100 4872072 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4862504&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F_TuAm-tfiww%2F By Tad DeHavenHarold Camping is “flabbergasted” that the world did not end on May 21st as he had predicted. I think it’s because he didn’t account for the devastation that will be wrought by Republican budget cuts for fiscal 2012, which doesn’t begin until October 1st. Therefore, Camping’s new predication that the world will end on October 21st is much more plausible. Yesterday the House Appropriations Committee’s subcommittee that deals with agriculture and nutrition programs passed its bill, which will now be considered by the full committee. According to the committee’s numbers, discretionary funding for these programs in 2012 would be $17.2 billion – a $2.7 billion reduction versus 2011. According to a statement released by the subcommittee’s ranking member, Sam Far... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4862504 Wed, 25 May 2011 20:28:46 +0100 4862504 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4862516&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FOPScn72xeE0%2F By Daniel J. MitchellOne of the biggest threats against global prosperity is the anti-tax competition project of a Paris-based international bureaucracy known as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The OECD, acting at the behest of the European welfare states that dominate its membership, wants the power to tell nations (including the United States!) what is acceptable tax policy. I’ve previously explained why the OECD is a problematic institution – especially since American taxpayers are forced to squander about $100 million per year to support the parasitic bureaucracy. For all intents and purposes, high-tax nations want to create a global tax cartel, sort of an “OPEC for politicians.” This issue is increasingly important since politicians f... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4862516 Tue, 24 May 2011 13:06:06 +0100 4862516 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4852846&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FPikhSJPN8_E%2F By David BoazThree stories in today’s Washington Post help us to understand why governments around the world are facing unmanageable deficits. On the front page: When Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero took power seven years ago, he and his Socialist Workers’ Party set out to perfect the welfare state in Spain. The goal was to equal— or even surpass — lavish social protections that have long been the rule for Spain’s Western European neighbors. True to his Socialist principles and riding an economic boom, Zapatero raised the minimum wage and extended health insurance to cover everything from sniffles to sex changes. He made scholarships available to all. Young adults got rent subsidies called “emancipation” money. Mothers got $3,500 for the birth of a child, todd... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4852846 Sun, 22 May 2011 16:11:23 +0100 4852846 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4841436&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FsSGo76ioxcw%2F By Neal McCluskeyThe most recent, comprehensive Pew higher education survey has gotten a lot of coverage for its findings on how important the public thinks college is, its financial payoff for grads, etc. For some reason, though, by far the most interesting statistic in the report has gotten roughly zero play, either from Pew itself or media coverage of the report: “Among all college graduates, 33% say they are in a job that does not require a college degree.” Wait. One-third of all college graduates are in jobs that don’t call for a college education? So one-third of all college degrees are quite possibly total economic wastes? (To be fair, no doubt some of those grads are looking for jobs requiring a degree, mitigating this somewhat. On the flip side, many job... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4841436 Wed, 18 May 2011 17:32:46 +0100 4841436 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=4841439&cid=t_101646_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FqRIAhs4x1uk%2F By Tad DeHavenLast week I discussed the Obama administration’s decision to redistribute federal high-speed rail money rejected by Florida Gov. Rick Scott. I noted that “Florida taxpayers were spared their state’s share of maintaining the line, but they’re still going to be forced to help foot the bill for passenger-rail projects in other states.” My underlying point was that the states should be allowed to make their own transportation decisions with their own money. Two Michigan state policymakers — both Republican — want to send the same message to Washington. State representatives Paul Opsommer and Tom McMillin have introduced resolutions that call on the federal government to allow the states to keep the federal gasoline taxes that they send to Washington. (Opsomm... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=4841439 Wed, 18 May 2011 12:56:44 +0100 4841439