The Hill was thrown into near chaos this week when Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) unveiled the Inflation Reduction Act. Republicans charged that Manchin misled them into supporting a $280 billion chips and science bill — a bill they would have otherwise opposed. Others criticized the name of the bill, which contains a significant number of climate change items long sought by the Democrats. Now, the respected Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania has found that the Inflation Reduction Act would actually have no impact on inflation.
Manchin premised his change on the fact that the bill would reduce inflation despite raising taxes and expenditures. The Act would combat climate change, extend enhanced Obamacare subsidies, and reduce the budget deficit by roughly $300 billion. Figures like Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) admitted that much of the Build Back Better bill is now in the Act.
Jon Huntley and John Ricco found that the bill “would reduce non-interest cumulative deficits by $248 billion over the budget window with no impact on GDP in 2031. The impact on inflation is statistically indistinguishable from zero.”
That is $52 billion less in deficit reduction than claimed by the Democrats and the review found the bill would actually “very slightly increase inflation until 2024 and decrease inflation thereafter.”
Here are two very important parts of this bill that explains why Republicans are so upset.
“ Prescription drug price reforms. Allows Medicare to negotiate the price of certain prescription drugs; limits Medicare and commercial price growth of certain drugs to inflation; repeals the implementation of a “rebate rule” scheduled to increase drug-related Medicare outlays beginning in 2027; redesigns Medicare Part D benefit formula and caps out-of-pocket costs for beneficiaries.”
That should be a huge win.
“ IRS funding. Appropriates approximately $80 billion over the next decade for IRS enforcement activities including the hiring and training of new auditors, IT systems modernization, and taxpayer services.”
This would allow the IRS to actually enforce the laws on the books. Something republicans didn’t like. No wonder they are so upset.
No the drug bill is not a huge win.
When is the last time you saw price controls work ? The answer is easy – NEVER.
There is only one way to reduce the cost of anything – free markets. Nothing else EVER works.
BTW Trump did something similar to this – and that was no better an idea.
In the unlikely event medicare saves money – wgich I will bet heavily will not occur, all that means is that costs for the rest of us go up, or fewer new drugs are developed, or some other unseen large negative effect.
Some timeless advice on economics from the 19th century.
http://bastiat.org/en/twisatwins.html
We have created a system of intermediaries where pharmaceuticals are concerned. There is no reason for the prices to be as high as they are. We have artificially increased the costs because contrary to what many think, in general, we are over insured. That means everyone buys the most expensive medications even when not needed.
The government added to that with Medicare Part D because instead of placing a ceiling on medications it placed a floor. When Medicare Part D was in the discussion stage I used to refer to it as the Merck bailout. Based on prior experience Medicare negotiating for medications is not a good idea. It’s government and monopoly working together to determine what medications we will be permitted to take.
A partial solution is to permit Americans to buy their medications abroad and to end the price fixing by the intermediaries.
There are many many reasons drug prices are high. All of which are the absence of normal market factors.
One HUGE factor is the absence of small and medium businesses. PPACA moved that from just drug companies to much of the rest of the medical field.
A free market is ALWAYS a pyramid – lots of small businesses at the bottom, less medium businesses in the middle and few large businesses at the top.
It is this structure that delivers the greatest competitiveness and the lowest prices.
Small business is not god’s gift to the world, but it is essential to a well functioning economy.
I attack socialism here constantly. But I also periodically make it clear that all forms of stattism will fail in much the same way.
As will any economic system without that pyramid model that I noted.
Government regulation destroys small and medium businesses. That is why big business often advocates for regulation.
Regardless without the presence of the threat from small and medium businesses big businesses are less competitive and less productive.
All of the above is just ONE of many reasons why free markets are essential in everything.
Another reason that small and medium businesses are required – is because there are problems and markets too small for big business to enter.
Today the development of a drug costs $2B. No drug company will even attempt to develop a drug that is not capable of producing more than $2B in profits.
There are plenty of problems that could bee solved by drugs that no one is even trying to solve – because the market is too small.
The pharmaceutical industry we have today is the perfect demonstration of not just the failure of socialism, but the failure of homogenous bigness.
Do not get me wrong – Big Businesses are critical too.
Very very many things have a paretto distribution. It is even predictable what will distribute on a bell curve and what will distribute paretto.
Trying to force any other distribution – will always reduce efficiency and make us all worse off.
Drug re-importation would have a rapid positive effect on drug costs in the US.
It would not change drug company profits.
It would note restructure the drug industry.
What it would do is raise drug costs a bit worldwide and lower them dramatically in the US.
It is something we should do,
But it is a short term stop gap, and it will piss off much of the world – especially Europe.
It will also likely result in retaliatory laws – by foreign countries barring drug imports to the US
The most consequential long term impacts on US (and global) drug prices are the rise in standard of living in China and India.
Last I checked the standard o living in China was about 1/4 that of the US. That is NOT enough to support the expensive drugs that americans buy.
But it is way more than enough to support less expensive drugs. Combined China and India are 10 times the market that the US is.
But only for much more affordable drugs.
Either western companies will start to target that market – or companies in China and india will.
This is somewhat complicated by the power competition between the US and China.
It does not matter alot where in the world drugs (or chips) are produced unless nations are in a hot or cold war.
Increasingly the US and China are in a cold war.
“It will also likely result in retaliatory laws – by foreign countries barring drug imports to the US”
John, such retaliatory actions would likely be the drug companies shipping only certain amounts of drugs to different countries to prevent such secondary sales. Why would a country like Canada not want the added income? It is the drug companies that are hurt. I think that would open up a hole bigger than you suspect and might lead to people using alternate brands since the $10 pill is not necessarily better than a $1 one.
The expensive drugs used here are markedly lower elsewhere. The marginal cost of a month’s supply of pills is near zero for most. Making a smaller profit elsewhere gives the companies additional income so some expensive drugs are quite inexpensive elsewhere.
The insurers are keeping the prices of drugs up and this is facilitated by the government. The Epi-Pen went as high as $800. The only thing that is patented is the mechanism. The epinephrine costs near zero. My understanding is that there was an alternative patent available several years ago and that the pen was listed for $200. The problem is that people with insurance do not care about the list price. They care only about what they pay. The insurers probably paid in the vicinity of $600 a pen. (This is old data when I last checked some years ago.)The insured pays a variable amount but probably around $80. Therefore, he won’t use the $200 pen which is not reimbursable. His costs are distributed as pennies to everyone else’s premiums.
If drugs were charged differently than they are today, the prices would radically fall. What was yesterday’s gold standard used by billionaire’s, is not what people want. They want the newest and most costly medication. They get it because the insurers charge cost plus when they figure out their premiums, and the higher the costs of medications, the more profit they make.
The explanation to some of what you are addressing is “marginal costs”.
Any item that has huge upfront costs, and very low production costs, is prone to get heavily discounted.
Drug countries MUST recoup development costs – that means they MUST charge high prices somewhere.
That will be the richest most affluent market in the world.
Drug companies can not survive – without high US drug costs – without raising prices everywhere.
But so long as they get the high US prices – they can sell exactly the same drug to the EU at half price profitably, and to Africa at 1/10th the price – profitably.
I do projects that often require me to travel. I have traveled as far as the Virgin Islands for a project.
a project in my back yard costs much less than one 1000 miles away.
But if you hire me to do a project 7 hours away – and pay my travel and other premiums for going 7 hours away,
I will immediately contact all my clients and offer them discounts on projects in that area 7hrs away.
I received several thousand dollars to do ONE project in Cincinatti. But I did 7 projects while I was out there, and the rest were at normal fees, because my upfront costs were already paid.
“Drug companies can not survive – without high US drug costs – without raising prices everywhere.”
Before we had so much interference in healthcare new drugs would come out with premium costs only afforded by those with extra cash and perhaps those that needed those drugs. This gave the drug company time to recoup profits and the patent helped. Soon competitive drugs with new patents came into the market place and the prices started to fall. Eventually, they were generic sold at a tiny price.
Many think what we have today is much better, but they are wrong because drugs that cost very little are now costing huge amounts. Drugs are being overused. Hypertension is a good example. The idea is to get the blood pressure down and that doesn’t need the most expensive drug.
When Hillary was talking about a person who couldn’t eat because her pharmaceutical bills were so high, what she did was pick out the most expensive drugs when at the time for most patients drugs at a tiny fraction of the cost would do the job.
One of the problems we have today is the FDA approval process.
I can name a number of patent expired drugs that have no generic equivalent.
Why ? Because the FDA will not approve a generic that is not 100% identical in some cases with full blown $2B testing.
I was involved briefly in generic Nitroglycerin – something that is a century old.
The FDA was blocking approval over differences in the bottle that contained it.
You can not produce a generic epipen even though all patents are expired and all it is is predosed epinepherine.
We rant because some pharma CEO raises the price when all that is needed is to stop the FDA from acting stupid.
Markets will do the rest.
If you want the best system for Drugs or anything – you want free markets – without government manipulation and distortion.
In a free market – the marginal pricing I described will still happen, but less so, Because if low enough prices are offered to one client or one place,
Someone will realize they can make money by buying that product in the discounted location and reselling it in the high price region.
In a free market marginal pricing will never go away, but the dispartiy will remain low enough that things like drug re-importation never happen.
I would note that the “scheme” that Charles Ponzi actually engaged in was NOT what we call a ponzi scheme it was much more like profiting from drug re-importation.
Ponzi found he could buy stamps in Italy, transport them to the US and resell them for more than they cost – because of price discrepancies.
Something similar to this was the cause for many of the recessions/depressions in the 19th century.
The us made the mistake of having a bi-metal monetary standard. With the government – usually congress setting the price of gold and silver.
Any error in the relative pricing allowed “speculators” to essentially print their own money – much as Ponzi did with stamps.
John, without question, healthcare should be in the free marketplace. If people wish to add charity, they can as long as it has the least negative effect on the marketplace. If people want a true safety net, that would be ok as well, though free market places work best. I follow Hayak’s advice on healthcare. I follow Friedman’s advice on high deductibles.
We are not going to get a free market place so I will settle for smaller changes where the free marketplace is mostly intact. I guess that we waste somewhere in the vicinity of 50% of our healthcare dollars. You can argue for a free marketplace, but you will not get it. It is better to have half of a loaf of bread than none at all.
There is a way we may get to free markets or unfortunately totalitarianism. And one or the other is increasingly likely.
That way is through failure.
I hope democrats get the $hit kicked out of them in November.
Not because I hate democrats or love republicans.
But because we need two sane parties – not one sane party and bat$hit crazy democrats.
The democratic party should have tacked to the center after 2016.
Instead they jumped the shark.
With respect to the IRS – a tiny portion of tax payers pay the majority of tax revenues.
Those tax payers have an army of lawyers and accountants. The government will never get anywhere trying to pry more out of them.
They do not cheat, but they know every single legal trick in the book.
Rather than expand the IRS – we could get rid of most of it with no impact.
You will not get more revenue from heightened enforcement – plenty of presidents have claimed they would, none have.
Those new IRS agents – are not going after the rich. They are going after you and I.
Neither of these proposals are especially new.
How many times do they have to fail before you grasp “this time will not be different” ?
Democrats used a tactic that Mitch McConnell has used before. Republicans are upset that they got rolled. What did republicans do? They childishly and cowardly chose to retaliate by not voting on the PACT act that had overwhelming bipartisan support. Instead republicans chose to shaft veterans on much needed health care because they got rolled by democrats using Republican tactics.
Republicans play politics all the time.
I am unaware of any instance in which they made a deal with democrats that they reneged on it.
If you have such an example – provide it.
There is a gigantic difference between taking advantage of the system, and outright lying.
When those you work with lie to you, will not play by the rules,
Then you can not trust them – and you do not even try to work with them.
If democrats lied to republicans, they should not expect even the tiniest cooperation in the future.
I am not a big McConnell fan, but he is definitely not someone I would stab in the back.
Have fun in the future.
What is much needed is massive cuts in government spending.
Every few years were are told that there is something Veterans need – and that is probably true.
What they need is a system that works – rather than just consumes tax dollars without offering any benefits.
Spending more money will not help veterans.
It will not help anyone.
Ronald Reagan’s budget director, David Stockman, said taxes were the price of civilized society. By the way “conservative” Ronald Reagan raised taxes 11 times during his administration. Stockman also pointed at that today’s Republicans have taken “Trickle Down” economics out of context, that economic theory doesn’t work in a vacuum.
Real fiscal-conservatives should love the Schumer-Manchin bill. Democrats actually pay for their bill without raising taxes on Americans making less than $400,000 per year. It only charges corporations a minimum 15% tax, most working class Americans pay way more than 15%. At the same time the greatest deficit reduction since Bill Clinton left Bush a balanced budget.
By contract, George W. Bush gave the richest 1% a tax cut WITHOUT paying for it. Bush charged it to USA’s credit card for our children and grandchildren to pay back. Bush economic policies almost collapsed the stock market in 2008, almost causing a Great Depression.
“David Stockman, said taxes were the price of civilized society.”
– AZ
____
And the Framers said that Congress was severely and extremely limited and restricted from taxing and regulating free and self-reliant American people.
The only question is why isn’t the Supreme Court doing its duty and fulfilling its sworn oath to support and assure the implementation of those severe and extreme limitations and restrictions on taxation and regulation.
The Constitution does not allow power-hungry, narcissistic, and oppressive tyrants to do anything they want, especially antithetical, anti-constitutional, anti-American communists (liberals, progressives, socialists, democrats, RINOs).
Karl Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto 59 years after the adoption of the Constitution because none of the principles of the Communist Manifesto were in the Constitution. Had the principles of the Communist Manifesto been in the Constitution, Karl Marx would have had no reason to write the Communist Manifesto. The principles of the Communist Manifesto were not in the Constitution then and the principles of the Communist Manifesto are not in the Constitution now.
When you raise taxes on corporations, the corporations will raise prices. It’s inflationary. And even with a so called minimum tax, Congress picks winners and loser by subsiding contributors (solar, wind, e-vehicles, insurance companys, unions, PBS) the list is endless.
RE:”When you raise taxes on corporations, the corporations will raise prices..” It stands to reason, doesn’t it. The ‘pay their fair share doctrine’, a tale told to idiots, designed to benefit the idiots who tell the tale. The increase eventually filters down to and becomes the province of those who can least afford to sustain it, yet persist in continuing to support the idiots who deceive them.
CORPORATE TAXES
A scam which will live in infamy.
Corporations do not have money.
Corporations obtain money from customers.
Corporations do not pay taxes.
The customers of corporations pay taxes.
“No such theory has been found in even the most voluminous and learned histories of economic theories, including J.A. Schumpeter’s monumental 1,260-page History of Economic Analysis. Yet this non-existent theory* has become the object of denunciations from the pages of the New York Times and the Washington Post to the political arena. It has been attacked by Professor Paul Krugman of Princeton and Professor Peter Corning of Stanford, among others, and similar attacks have been repeated as far away as India. It is a classic example of arguing against a caricature instead of confronting the argument actually made.”
Which theory?
AZ wrote: “Stockman also pointed at that today’s Republicans have taken “Trickle Down” economics out of context, “
Thank you.
The phrase “Trickle down economics” is a misnomer.
The distribution of money – like myriads of other things is a Pareto distribution.
Whether we like that or not.
Efforts to change that will inherently make us all poorer.
Just stay out of the way and do not worry about it.
Money is not the same as wealth. And the rest of us end up fine.
AZ Reagan was 4 decades ago. Lots has been learned since then.
Lots has changed.
If you wish to beleive this bill will work – that is your peragoative.
But that will not change several things that are certain.
It will not work – it is not even a hail mary. It is just a lie.
Even if it did work – it would be one grain of sand in the ocean.
Not a single positive outcome promised will materialize.
BTW, I am not a republican – though I am old enough to remember Reagan and the 80’s,
and Old enough to know that while your Facts might be correct – they are horribly misleading.
In 1980 the top tax rate was 70%. In 1988 it was 28%.
Reagan may have raised taxes 11 times – but from the start to the end of his presidency tax rates dropped dramatically.
It is claims such as yours that have left the left without trust.
Given a choice between stockman and Friedman – I will take Friedman everytime.
“. . . without raising taxes on Americans . . .” “It only charges corporations a minimum 15% tax . . .”
Who do you think works at those corporations? And who do you think its customers are?
biden’s “minders” will simply dismiss any opinions like these, no matter the qualifications of those with facts and factual bases. Let’s wait and see what they will write for their mentally-deficient old white guy to read. IMHO, simply changing the name of the legislation from BBB to “anti-Inflation” something or other does not disguise this awful set of spending programs, but it will appeal to those who are D-sycophants. SHAME on WVa’s Manchin.
When will the judicial branch, with emphasis on the Supreme Court, begin to do its duty per its sworn oath to assure that all actions support and comport with the “manifest tenor” of the Constitution?
Congress has the power to tax merely, “…to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States;…”
Congress has no enumerated power to regulate “inflation.”
Congress cannot tax to regulate or effect “inflation.”
The entire communistic American welfare state is unconstitutional including, but not limited to, matriculation affirmative action, grade-inflation affirmative action, employment affirmative action, quotas, welfare, food stamps, minimum wage, rent control, social services, forced busing, public housing, utility subsidies, WIC, SNAP, TANF, HAMP, HARP, TARP, HHS, HUD, EPA, Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Labor, Energy, Obamacare, Social Security, Social Security Disability, Social Security Supplemental Income, Medicare, Medicaid, “Fair Housing” laws, “Non-Discrimination” laws, etc.
Article 1, Section 8, provides Congress the power to tax ONLY for “…general Welfare…,” omitting and, thereby, excluding any power to tax for individual welfare, specific welfare, particular welfare, favor or charity. The same article enumerates and provides Congress the power to regulate ONLY money, the “flow” of commerce, and land and naval Forces. Additionally, the 5th Amendment right to private property is not qualified by the Constitution and is, therefore, absolute, allowing Congress no power to claim or exercise dominion over private property, the sole exception being the power to “take” private property for public use. If the right to private property is not absolute, there is no private property, and all property is public.
Government exists, under the Constitution and Bill of Rights, to provide maximal freedom to individuals while government is severely limited and restricted to merely facilitating that maximal freedom of individuals through the provision of security and infrastructure only.
For fiscal-conservatives this is a major deficit-reduction bill and this bill is only about 10% of what the “Build Back Better” plan was. It reduces inflation on oil, prescription drugs and puts more money in American’s pockets. Democrats – not Republicans – have delivered smaller budget deficits than any Republican in over 20 years.
Crazy, but you have your right to say it.
Really?
Do you actually beleive what you are saying ?
The last time we saw meaningful deficit reduction was when the USSR collapsed and our military spending did not need to keep increasing.
This is nonsense.
Tax increases will not bring in additional revenue – please look at any graph of tax revenues vs, tax changes – there is no correlation at all.
Tax revenues depend on the economy – not tax rates and the economy is tanking.
The best possible outcome from this is that it might not make things dramatically worse.
HOW LONG DOES AMERICA LISTEN WHILE THEY CRY WOLF?
HOW LONG SHALL THEY BE TAKEN SERIOUSLY?
OF COURSE, THE CLIMATE HAS CHANGED FOR 4.5 BILLION YEARS.
________________________________________________________
FROM INTRODUCTION TO DEMISE – FROM WEST SUSSEX TO UNIVERSITY OF EAST ANGLIA
“Global Warming?”
“The Early Twentieth Century”
“As man is now changing the composition of the atmosphere at a rate which must
be very exceptional on the geological time scale, it is natural to seek for the
probable effects of such a change. From the best laboratory observations it
appears that the principal result of increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide . . .
would be a gradual increase in the mean temperature of the colder regions of the
earth.”
—G. S. Callendar (1939)
____________________
“The Climategate Whitewash Continues”
“Global warming alarmists claim vindication after last year’s data manipulation scandal. Don’t believe the ‘independent’ reviews.”
“Last November there was a world‐wide outcry when a trove of emails were released suggesting some of the world’s leading climate scientists engaged in professional misconduct, data manipulation and jiggering of both the scientific literature and climatic data to paint what scientist Keith Briffa called “a nice, tidy story” of climate history. The scandal became known as Climategate.”
– Patrick J. Michaels, 2010
Take a look at the SEC’s Climate Risk Disclosure Proposal for an example of how government agencies have been politicized by climate activists.
It is typical of the left to pollute the entire government with their nonsense.
The objective is to be able to accomplish whatever they want if the control one branch of government or even one department.
RE:”For many, the Congress has become more bold in mislabeling legislation..The old saying goes “If you believe that, I have a bridge in Brooklyn for sale that you might be interested in!”
I have always been troubled by Congressional misnomers. Literary techniques like alliteration are frequently used, e.g. “Build Back Better.” It was a catchy name, but it did not help the populace develop any understanding of the proposed legislation.
In the mutual fund industry there is a specific SEC rule that prohibits a fund from having a name that would be misleading to investors. I have some thoughts about how legislation could be more transparent to taxpayers who foot the bill.
First, limit the number of topics that could be included, and establish a word limit for each one.
Second, require a name for the legislation that is not misleading.
Third, require sponsors of the legislation to sign an attestation that neither they nor members of their families have a conflict of interest in proposing the legislation.
Fourth, require the sponsors of the legislation to prepare an accurate abstract of the proposed legislation that would be available on a a government website, together with a link to the actual proposed legislation.
Fifth, require every member of Congress to notify his or her constituents of any proposed legislation beginning with an initial mailing to constituents informing them of the availability of the abstracts and related proposals and describing a mechanism pursuant to which the constituents can submit comments on the proposed legislation.
Sixth, adopt rules that establish a reasonable comment period for the submission of comments.
Seventh, require members of Congress to actually read the proposed legislation and the comments received from constituents before casting a vote on the proposed legislation.
For the record, I am not familiar with the policies, procedures and rules of the Rules Committees, but that would be a worthy project.
Well said!
Catherine, do you intend to bring common sense to government?
Americans making less than $400,000 annually would not receive a tax increase. This plan is more conservative than Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower who had a top tax rate around 70% and created massive public infrastructure projects. More conservative than Richard Nixon’s universal healthcare plan.
Respectfully disagree on the inflation part. This plan would drastically reduce oil inflation for decades to come, reducing oil demand. A better plan would be to remove the all-electric vehicle restrictions on auto manufacturers, that would reduce oil inflation even more and is very democratic. Consumers of all-electric vehicles are also voters. This plan would also reduce prescription drug inflation, capping costs at $2000 max per American.
Matt Whitlock
@mattdizwhitlock
·
Reminder: that these tax hikes on families making $30,000/year are intended to fund tax credits so families making $300,000 can buy cheaper electric cars.
Dems really shoving that political realignment along.
“Americans making less than $400,000 annually would not receive a tax increase.”
BS.
That 15% is a tax on *all* Americans.
“. . . reducing oil demand.”
Really? And how do you expect to produce the electricity needed to supply the increased demand? Clicking your heels? Twinkling your nose?
So instead of $10 trillion of cumulative deficit over the next 10 years, we’ll only have $9.7 trillion of cumulative deficit. By the way, will someone be keeping score? What a joke this experiment in self government has become. After the accomplishments of the greatest generation, look what we’ve done.
If they raised taxes and spending by the same amount neither inflation nor deflation. Just cash redistribution. Different buyers using it in a different way, but still demand.
“Fact check” = Enable gaslighters
PolitiFact has labeled as false or misleading comments that state the obvious: D’s are manipulating the meaning of “recession,” in order to save their skins.
And, of course, the usual suspects (Google, Facebook) run with the truth-is-false labeling.
More oxy-morons peddled to the morons. So contingently, it would reduce Fed Deficit by $300 Billion in 10 years? Well hammer out the medals for these big liars.
Fed Gov’t is In debt of approx $31 Trillion and growing, and that is not including off balance sheet items, and is Undeclared Bankrupt. You will observe and be impacted by a huge ” Reset” by or before Oct 31, 2022. This will also reflect the removal of Kam H and Joe Biden. Selah
Outright deceit… All to hide from the public what they are actually doing. Figures won’t Lie but Liars will Figure…
If any of these monies go to deficit reduction I’ll be shocked. Raising taxed, increasing the deficit, at least short term, and printing/spending more money during a period of high inflation and the start of a recession is just plain nuts. We’ll juts have to wait and see how it turns out. As an aside, I never thought that I would agree with anything coming out of Wharton, so maybe the other place is starting to get frosty
Whig, I know I asked this question before, but I don’t know you read all the postings so I am asking again. You posted gun statistics from Sowell. I tried to find it so I could better utilize numbers that make sense. I couldn’t find them. If you have an address or even more information that would lead me to the answer, I would appreciate it. If you no longer have anything additional, can you respond so I know you got this note.
Thanks.
I’ll see what I can do. May have been a Sowell group on FB
This is all smoke and mirrors and always has been. I am old enough to remember God knows how many budget projections Congress, the president, and so called think tanks have have upchucked into the public sphere with grand promises of reducing the deficit and cutting taxes, and/or providing help to the middle class and/or working families. These pronouncements with their glittering statistical charts supported by an endless number of pompous pols are nothing more than a rhetorical flourish to fool the public into thinking that government action can actually improve their lives. Nowadays, the government does not serve the people. The government serves the government first followed by a coterie of blood suckers in the universities, non-government agencies, and corporate oligarchs in Silicaon Valley and Wall Street. These projections will be flushed down the memory hole by next week when, voila, a new study is published to show just the opposite of this one.
John Rich Anti Woke song hits Number 1.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=v6tOAafAJCA
Margot, the other day I tried to listen to his songs on Spotify and they couldn’t find him. Today Spotify has loads of his songs. I make sure that I request such music that might otherwise be denied because of Wokeness.
Progressive prices follow from single/central/monopolistic solutions. Labor (e.g. immigration reform, practical and actual slavery) and environmental (e.g. Green deals, shared/shifted responsibility) arbitrage only delay but do not curb its progress.