In two recent posts I have discussed ideas for freeing the doctor and freeing the employee from the traps of our current healthcare system. In this post I turn to freeing the retirees. For more details, please consult my book, Priceless: Curing the Healthcare Crisis (The Independent Institute, 2012). There are 78 million baby...
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With great sadness, I note the passing on September 8 of the man I have long described as the greatest living libertarian. Thomas Szasz was, among other things, a powerful influence on the movement to release people who were being held in prisons on “psychiatric” grounds, even though they had not been convicted of...
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On the eve of September 10, 2001, I went to sleep a libertarian, distrustful of the state, holding both major political parties in contempt, seeing the federal government as the primary enemy of the American people, their lives and liberties. The next morning, watching the horrific news of the murderous attacks on the World...
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There’s almost nothing to add to the story below covered by Judicial Watch, the Canada Free Press, U.S. News and World Report, and others. Eleven years after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, Americans are subjected daily to humiliation, not to mention extreme inconvenience, by the “security” measures instituted by the grand new agency created...
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How to Make Health Insurance Portable For the working age population, one of the biggest problems in the US healthcare system is that health insurance is not portable. In general, when you leave your employer, you must eventually lose the health insurance plan your employer was providing. Almost all the problems people have with...
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The latest feminist volley, “Finding balance requires changing the lives of men,” from Professors Joan C. Williams and Anne-Marie Slaughter, calls to mind nothing so much as “Harrison Bergeron,” Kurt Vonnegut’s brilliant short story projecting to its logical conclusion what the demand for strict equality would result in: everyone equally handicapped. Thus, as employers...
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The case for liberating physicians from the dictates of third-party payers Of all the people in the healthcare system, none is more central than the physician. As I explain in my book Priceless: Curing the Healthcare Crisis, fundamental reform that lowers costs, raises quality, and improves access to care is almost inconceivable without physicians...
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With the very exciting, rapid development of online learning, I am delighted that new programs to provide excellent courses in economics and history have recently been launched by scholars who have worked with the Independent Institute. 1. The first is from the historian and best-selling author Thomas E. Woods, Jr. (Senior Fellow, Ludwig von...
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In the 1990s, I read an interview with a rock star optimistic about the country’s direction. He thought President Clinton’s admission to having tried marijuana was a good sign. America was becoming more socially liberal. The new generation was in charge. And as one consequence, maybe the disastrous war on drugs would end. Not...
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The twenty-first century opened with optimism, as first the technology sector and then the housing sector boomed. But then came the financial crisis and the Great Recession—the worst economic malaise since the 1930s. Why, after several decades of economic stability, did the business cycle return with such force? Most attempts to answer this question...
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