Dean Baker's Blog, page 521

When it Comes to Doctors and the Health Care Industry, the NYT is Staunchly Protectionist

The NYT is generally a strong supporter of more open trade. However, for some reason its editorial on constraining costs in Medicare never mentioned an increased role for trade. This is peculiar since the fact that the health care system in the United States is so much more costly than health care systems elsewhere in the world (we pay more than twice as much per person for our care as people in other wealthy countries) means that there are large opportunities of gains from trade.

People who ...

Does the NYT Find It Stimulating to Hear Politicians Talk About "Job-Killing" Regulations and Taxes?

That's what readers of the Sunday Magazine piece on Elizabeth Warren might conclude. At one point it tells readers:

"When pressed on what kind of formidable legislation she would actually pursue in the Senate, Warren's organization served up a snoozy list of the priorities that Democrats have been talking about for years: she will push for spending on infrastructure, education and renewable energy. She will work to strengthen labor unions and advocate for the reregulation of the big banks...

Supercommittee Democrats Insist on Not Giving Republicans Everything

In much of the media it is the rule that both parties are equally to blame regardless of what the facts of the situation are. Hence the lead sentence in the Post's article on the supercommittee's deadlock tells readers:

"Congressional negotiators made a yet another push Friday to carve $1.2 trillion in savings from the federal debt, but remained stuck in their entrenched positions on tax policy even as the clock was running down on their efforts to reach a deal."

It would be interesting to...

David Brooks Confuses the United States with Greece

It is easy to get Greece and the United States confused, after all they are both in the northern hemisphere. Okay, this is a case where someone making the comparison puts their ignorance and/or dishonesty in full public view. The three reasons why we are not Greece, in reverse order or importance are:

1) Greece had chronic budget deficits, with a rising debt to GDP ratio even in the upturn. Its government has great difficulty collecting revenue as tax evasion is the major national sport. The ...

Washington Post Has a Reasonable Piece on Supercommittee

This is worth mentioning amidst the near hysteria in the media over the prospect of a failed supercommittee. The Post piece began:

"If the congressional 'supercommittee' cannot agree on a plan to tame the federal debt by next week's deadline, as now appears likely, here's what will happen: nothing."

NYT Puts Editorial on Deficit Reduction in News Pages

Taking a cue from the Washington Post, the NYT ran an editorial on the budget deficit in its news pages. It told readers:

"At stake is not simply the country's fiscal health, but also what remains of the government's credibility. Without an agreement in sight, investors, business leaders and consumers, already worried about the deepening crisis in Europe, have begun to brace for the possibility of yet another blow to a fragile recovery, this time from Washington."

Is this a fact? The...

NPR Pushes Its Deficit Agenda With Full Force

Morning Edition had a piece warning us that the markets will be hard hit if the supercommittee doesn't reach a deal (sorry, no link yet). It attributed the decline in the stock market in the period around the debt ceiling battle to fears about default, even though bond prices actually rose in this period. Bonds are the asset on which the U.S. government might theoretically default.

So in NPR land, when investors increasingly fear a default on U.S. government bonds, they bid up the price of...

John Cassidy Still Has Not Heard About the Housing Bubble

John Cassidy, the long time economics writer for the New Yorker, apparently still has not gotten word about the housing bubble: you know, that $8 trillion run-up in house prices that collapsed and caused the financial crisis and the downturn. In a piece telling readers that President Obama has done about as good as could have been expected, he commented:

"And bailing out underwater homeowners on the scale necessary to raise house prices would have been a huge logistical and political...

George Will Says the 1990 Budget deal Caused the Recession That Started Four Months Earlier

George Will gave a seriously inaccurate accounting of history in his Washington Post column today. He told readers:

"Sensible people who remember the last grand budget bargain will be dry-eyed about not having another now. Although only 21 of the 242 Republicans in the House and eight of 47 Republicans in the Senate were on Capitol Hill in 1990, everyone there should remember the results of that year's budget agreement, wherein President George H.W. Bush jettisoned his "no new taxes" pledge: ...

Unauthorized Copies Are Not "Pirated" Just Because Microsoft Says It

Someone has to tell the Post that things do not become true just because Microsoft or some other major corporation assert them. This problem pervades an article on efforts by the entertainment industry to force Internet companies to help them police their copyrights.

The article refers to the material in question as being pirated. This is in fact in dispute. In many cases, for example countries where the specific material involved is not protected by national copyright law, it is wrong to...