Sarah Kliff has a very helpful account of Vermont’s attempt to create a state-level single-payer health care system, and why it failed. It’s a bit like the old joke about the farmer, asked for directions, who says “Well, I wouldn’t start from here.” The point is not that single-payer is a bad idea. It is that given […]
The Clinton campaign is set to air this new, minute-long ad in Iowa and New Hampshire that has the feel of a closing argument: [picture from ad of a very solemn-faced Secretary of State Clinton standing next to Obama at the funeral of a fallen soldier or marine, and a link to the ad.] — […]
[T]there are serious questions about how we’re going to pay for what we want to see our country do. And, I’m the only candidate standing here tonight who has said I will not raise taxes on the middle class. I want to raise incomes, not taxes, and I’m going to do everything I can to […]
Second, single-payer would require a lot of additional tax revenue — and we would be talking about taxes on the middle class, not just the wealthy. It’s true that higher taxes would be offset by a sharp reduction or even elimination of private insurance premiums, but it would be difficult to make that case to […]
Denmark isn’t a middle-class, capitalist, entrepreneurial country? Because it has universal healthcare, free college, free day care, and guaranteed family and medical leave? Really, Secretary Clinton? Really? — Me, here, Oct. 14 No doubt surprising many of the people watching the Democratic presidential debate, Bernie Sanders cited Denmark as a role model for how to […]
Senator Sanders did vote five times against the Brady Bill. Since it was passed, more than 2 million prohibited purchases have been prevented. He also did vote, as he said, for this immunity provision. I voted against it. I was in the Senate at the same time. It wasn’t complicated to me. It was pretty […]
“People often talk about the electorate moving left,” said Clinton senior policy adviser Jake Sullivan. “I think it’s more that the electorate is just getting more practical. For Hillary Clinton, that matches her evidence-based approach. The arguments that persuade her are evidence-based and progressive.” He cited the growing consensus that mass incarceration is expensive and […]
Some of AB’s regular readers might have picked up on the fact that I’m obsessed with animal rescue. (Dan Crawford sure has!) And since AB is mostly an economics/fiscal-policy blog, it probably has readers who buy art and antiques. Soooo …. I thought I’d pass this along. The key sentence is near the end of the article: […]
Today, Martin O’Malley, the former Maryland governor who has been talking about challenging Clinton from the left, was repeatedly asked by reporters to comment on Clinton’s emails, and he repeatedly refused. Not because he doesn’t think there are legitimate questions here, but because his advisers say raising them might reflect badly on him: “His advisers say there’s […]
They’re spending it on lawyers! I’m not kidding. Brown told a 27-year-old Fidelity Investments retirement specialist that big corporations can’t afford to hire people because they’re spending so much money on lawyers. Which they have to do because of all those regulations. Which is why he wants to “loosen regulations on big companies”: “So they […]