The market economy is a remarkable institution: It reduces poverty, decreases discrimination, and provides opportunities for constructive social and economic advancement far more reliably than do government programs. And yet despite all the good that markets do, many people are dubious about the moral case for markets. As economist Dwight R. Lee writes in...
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The Institute of Medicine says we are wasting 30 cents of every dollar we spend on medical care. Originally I was going to pan the study, but I can’t resist a good read. Like this: If banking were like health care, automated teller machine (ATM) transactions would take not seconds but perhaps days or...
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Following on my recent post citing corporate CEOs’ complaint that continuing “Regime Uncertainty” forestalls their companies’ investing and hiring, corporate CFOs are today following suit, as reported by DeLoitte’s “CFO Signals“: CFOs’ expectations for sales and earnings growth both dropped precipitously this quarter, and their expectations for capital investment and hiring followed suit. The...
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Three features of ideal health insurance would make it especially superior to the health insurance arrangements that prevail today, as I outline in my recent book, Priceless: Curing the Healthcare Crisis. Ideal Health Insurance Is Patient Centered A large portion of our healthcare dollars would be placed in accounts that we individually own and control....
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John Stossel has often said “government can’t do anything better than people in a free market.”  I recognize that lots of readers of The Beacon will agree, so let me throw out one example that I believe counters Stossel’s claim: GPS. Uncle Sam put up those satellites that produce GPS signals, and none of...
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President Obama took time out of his hectic campaign schedule this week for a visit with the ladies of The View. Host Barbara Walters asked him, “What do you say to people who say you’re trying to redistribute the wealth?” Obama responded that he and his wife Michelle pay taxes so other people’s public-school...
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The modern era has inherited two models of health insurance: the fee-for-service model and the HMO model. Both models create perverse incentives for patients and their doctors. As I wrote in my recent book, Priceless: Curing the Healthcare Crisis, virtually all recent variations on these two models are attempts to ameliorate and control those perverse incentives—usually...
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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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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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