Should-Read: Justin Fox is right in noting that Paul Ryan...

Should-Read: Justin Fox is right in noting that Paul Ryan was always running a con game���that his aim was a more unequal country with lower taxes on the rich, not a country in which the federal government balanced its budget. But I would quarrel slightly with how he sets up this article. "Entitlement crisis" is a political framing that appeals not just to "very wealthy people and/or those with excellent health insurance": it also appeals to lazy centrist journalists with no understanding of demography or policy, and no desire to learn. We never had���and do not have���a Social Security crisis. We had���but apparently no longer have (but it may return)���a health care cost explosion crisis. We still have a we-pay-too-much-for-the-health-care-we-as-a-country-get crisis. "Entitlement crisis" leads us away from getting value for our social insurance spending, and toward an unequal and unhappy society: Justin Fox: Paul Ryan's Roadmap Was an Epic Fiscal Failure: "Paul Ryan did not cause the financial crisis.��He has nonetheless failed pretty spectacularly...��his actions have made the situation much worse than it had to be...

...I pin this on two main flaws in his approach: One has to do with the term "entitlement crisis," the other with tax policy. The big problem with "entitlement crisis" is that it's a political framing designed to appeal only to very wealthy people and/or those with excellent health insurance and retirement plans.... Improving��Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid so that they can keep delivering benefits is a political project that, while fraught with pitfalls, has a chance of eventual success. Hacking at them to avert an "entitlement crisis" decades in the future appears to be a non-starter. The reason I keep putting "entitlement crisis" in quotes is, first, that "social insurance" better describes the programs than "entitlements" does and, second, that projected increases in��social spending��alone��are unlikely to bring on a crisis. It��is increasing government spending without also increasing government revenue that could, eventually,��cause trouble....

Ryan got his way on tax��cuts while��making no progress whatsoever on that "entitlement crisis." A 0.8��percent-of-GDP drop in tax revenue isn't the end of the world. It is, however, a move in the wrong direction if you're worried about growing fiscal imbalances.... Raising the tax burden, though, was never part of Paul Ryan's plan. He wasn't even willing just to��hold it constant. Which��would seem to mean that he was never��all that serious about fixing America's fiscal ills...