There is one group of workers who have signed a consent decree with the federal government, agreeing to never form a union. Do you know who they are? Answer below the fold. The economics of unions is quite simple. Like medieval guilds, the goal of a modern union is to monopolize the supply of labor […]
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From USA Today (January 16, 2011) Most people intuitively know that the worst thing government can do in the middle of the deepest recession in 70 years is enact policies that increase the expected cost of labor. Yet that is exactly what happened last spring, with the passage of the health care reform bill, says […]
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I have decided to devote my first Health Alert of the New Year to “tolerance” and “rational thought” — terms that are rarely conjoined. The next time you are in an argument with someone over a public policy, stop and ask yourself: Can you summarize your opponent’s position in words that he would recognize and […]
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Here is Goodman’s Law for Efficient Purchasing: There is no such thing as a smart formula. A recent news articlereported Medicare paying $800 to rent a wheelchair that could have been purchased outright for $350. I sometimes wonder if health economists actually understand how other markets work. Let’s try a thought experiment. Suppose you ran […]
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**NCPA Health Policy Blog from November 1, 2010.** Suppose the Republicans win back the House of Representatives in tomorrow’s election. What will they do about health care? One idea, in the House Republican “Pledge to America,” calls for opening up the health insurance marketplace by allowing people to purchase insurance across state lines. Families USA […]
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We’re 10 years into the future and you have terminal cancer. Still, all is not lost. Doctors in other countries are reporting successful remission of your type of cancer, using a drug originally approved in the United States for some other purpose. There are several journal articles that appear to back up these claims and […]
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FREE recently hosted a conference, “Personal Health Care Choices and Public Policy,” for Federal Judges, State Supreme Court Justices, and Law Professors. This is an area fraught with supply and access problems, competing values, and political opportunism. Economics offers some important insights when considering them. John Goodman, Ph.D., is one of FREE’s senior fellows. John […]
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FREE recently hosted a conference, “Personal Health Care Choices and Public Policy,” for Federal Judges, State Supreme Court Justices, and Law Professors. This is an area fraught with supply and access problems, competing values, and political opportunism. Economics offers some important insights when considering them. What aspects of health care resemble a classic economic good? […]
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