Much of my success has been due to
keeping my mouth shut.
J. Ogden Armour
One of the Best Clips I've Seen on Healthcare
Familiar readers will recognize the point of shopping policies across state lines; I've pointed out this would be one of the few legitimate purposes of Congress regulating interstate commerce, i.e., promoting a free market. There's a reason why health insurance has costed more in Massachusetts than in Utah and Idaho, and it's not necessarily because the people are that much healthier; it has more to do with dysfunctional government policy. One of the major problems with ObamaCare is that it centralizes some of these mandates (take, for instance, guaranteed issue and community rating). A lot of mandates are added by special interest lobbies wanting to socialize their expenses. The argument here is insurers in high-mandate states losing market share to lower-mandate state-based insurers would finally argue for long overdue reforms vs. encouraging higher barriers to entry. "Progressives" understand this, which they call the race to the bottom.
Whereas "progressives" love to compare health to auto insurance (from a simplistic approach of demanding mandates) (keep in mind the real purpose of the mandate is to protect people and property from your causing an expensive accident beyond your means to reimburse), let's point out a few things. We don't include free preventive auto care, we don't pay for gas, oil changes, etc. with co-pays, we don't purchase auto insurance through our employers in tax-privileged benefits... I personally view this as an unintended consequences of the market corruption by government policy; health insurance as a way of controlling for a small risk of catastrophic health costs has mutated into a prepaid health services bundle where some health ordinary expenses are "more equal"--government is subsidizing ordinary expenses if you buy through an employer vs. on your own. But it probably doesn't make sense for auto insurers to handle the transactions for our ordinary auto expenses (imagine if we had to buy gas through only insurer-approved retailers); we probably know our local low-price gas station, our favorite reliable car mechanic, etc.
I do like one argument stressed in the clip: the employer chooses the healthcare vendor, not the individual policyholders....
Gary Galles, "In Trusting Politics and Politicians, It Is the Pope Who is Naïve": Thumbs UP!
I recently had a falling out with one of my favorite nephews over Pope Francis. My nephew is one of the 88% of American Catholics giving Francis high approval; he didn't like some comments I had to make about the Pope's economic illiteracy. I am more blunt than some Catholic libertarians; if Lew Rockwell or Jeffrey Tucker have written something, I haven't seen it. I've seen Tom Woods, a convert from Lutheranism, seemingly taking on wolf pack attacks from "social justice" theologians, whom have no more idea on how to run a lemonade stand than Barry Obama. (What's interesting is that a lot of libertarians, including myself, have a fondness for the older, richer traditional liturgy.)
I have analyzed the exhortation in multiple posts over the past month. But to be honest, I'm extremely angry over what I regard as his lack of intellectual integrity; he should never have written on a topic on which he has no background; he paraphrases cliches. Let's take a very simple example: toilets. I haven't read the history of plumbing, but I would suppose the first people to have toilets were wealthy individuals whom paid handsomely for the innovation. Add in the economies of scale, and now probably most people, at least in the developed world, have access to this modern convenience at a fairly modest cost. Go to any supermarket and you will find a variety of foods and beverages beyond our ancestors' wildest dreams; yet the upper 1% can only eat so much. I'm left-handed and have wide feet; when I was younger, I had a devil of a time finding suits to accommodate my athletic fit (wide shoulders, deep chest, bigger upper arms with a tapering towards the waist): but there are vendors whom address my needs. None of these vendors required government intervention. It's the same invisible hand the pontiff so incompetently scoffs at. Do these vendors make a profit? Hopefully, yes; otherwise, I may find fewer vendors and selection.
But I know that businessmen are more than just greed and profits, and Francis' incompetent straw man argument undermines his own credibility and relevance. My maternal grandfather as a grocer never discussed how much money he made, but he told me more than once that during the Depression he would go to open up the store (a few blocks away) late at night because his customers needed certain items. My mom said that he wrote off a lot of bad debt from deadbeat customers. He volunteered at church; he was a member of St. Vincent de Paul and gave to a number of charities.
One of the things in my more detailed analysis several posts back that I singled out (unlike a lot of people) was his talking point about discussing politics as a noble profession. One key point in Catholic doctrine is the importance of free will; Jesus talked about individual responsibility. And how Francis squares the circle with the parable of the talents is beyond me. In America we say "In God we trust", not "In politicians we trust". We fought a revolution over tyranny. Yet this same pope which scoffs at the idea of the invisible hand, although the evidence is all around him, has trust in politicians, like the Argentinian leadership which has run the economy into the ground?
I won't repeat Catholic economist Galles' piece here; it makes points complementary to my discussion; Galles is an economist whom effortlessly interleaves Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments, Spencer, Reisman, etc., all of whom I'm aware of during my own pro-liberty evolution.
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| Courtesy of the original artist via Illinois Policy Institute |
I believe you're probably a sarcastic troll, but even economic illiterates stumble upon the truth by mistake. The fact is that corporations can't sustain a business model based on damaging or killing its customers and they still are responsible for any alleged harm to the rights of others. The first principle for any business is to know and serve the customer; since businesses can't force you to transact (without government protecting the business, establishing a mandate, etc.), they depend on their ability to persuade and/or loyal customers, favorable word of mouth, etc.
(Ron Paul). Government Policies Hurt Low-Wage Workers -- read my latest Texas Straight Talk at the link and find out why government attempts to help the poor end up hurting them more. And please share! tinyurl.com/mron9vc [A lot of "progressive" trolls responded bitching about inadequacy of the minimum wage, pushing Card-Krueger nonsense, etc.
Some troll is talking Econ 101. Price-fixing that is not based on the market--and this includes minimum or maximum wages--violates core economic principles. Artificially high minimums result in surpluses, e.g., unemployment. (Artificially low prices result in shortages--think ice after a power failure and counter-productive price-gauging laws. ) There may be a surplus of low-skilled laborers; a politician trying to manipulate wages cannot force a business to hire a worker above his productivity. The way for a worker to increase his wage is not to rely on government to price him out of work opportunities but to gain value-added skills and knowledge which make him more productive from an employer standpoint.
As for the trolls griping about inflation undermining the artificial wage floor, blame bad government policy from easy money monetary policy to various dysfunctional legislation (including, but not restricted to, price supports, import tariffs/quotas, occupational licensing, employer mandates, etc.)
(John Stossel). #Innovation threatens centralized power.
Innovation is difficult to model; it can change markets, make laws obsolete and irrelevant, and overwhelm legislators and regulators. Government can't capture an invisible hand short of enslaving the population.
For Catholic Readers
Randy England posted the following limited-term offer on the Catholic libertarians Facebook group:
For all my friends at Catholic Libertarians, I want you to have a free ebook copy of Free is Beautiful. The coupon code is good as long as 2013 lasts. Please share this link with Catholic friends ~ Randy England
http://freeisbeautiful.net/catholic-libertarian-free-ebook/
Musical Interlude: My iPod Shuffle Holiday Series
Nat King Cole, "The Christmas Song"
