Update on China Import "Scandal"

In light of today's news that Mattel has taken responsibility for the majority of the toy recalls as being design flaws, I wonder if Lou Dobbs will take back his comments that this case shows why intense government regulation of imports is necessary (and that free marketers and libertarians are thus "idiotic"). For some reason, I'm not holding my breath.

Key quote:

On Friday, Debrowski acknowledged that "vast majority of those products that were recalled were the result of a design flaw in Mattel's design, not through a manufacturing flaw in China's manufacturers."
Lead-tainted toys accounted for only a small percentage of all toys recalled, he said, adding that: "We understand and appreciate deeply the issues that this has caused for the reputation of Chinese manufacturers."
In a statement issued by the company, Mattel said its lead-related recalls were "overly inclusive, including toys that may not have had lead in paint in excess of the U.S. standards.
"The follow-up inspections also confirmed that part of the recalled toys complied with the U.S. standards," the statement said.

In other words, this was not a case where free international trade resulted in harm to US consumers. Instead, it was a case where a manufacturer had a poor product design that resulted in a marginally higher risk of injury from the product's use. As a result, Mattel pulled products with the potential for such a marginally higher risk off of the shelves. To the extent any injuries were caused as a result, Mattel will almost certainly be sued under the common law; as long as government regulations and protectionist laws don't get in the way, Mattel will then be forced to make the injured parties whole (to the extent possible of course). In other words, this is probably going to be a case that shows how the free market works - not how it failed.
Finally, it's worth pointing out that, had Mattel chosen to manufacture these toys in the US, the potential problems would have been even worse because of the higher labor costs. Higher labor costs would mean that Mattel would have to cut the cost of its raw materials in order to meet its price point- this means smaller parts made with more dangerous materials. Even if Mattel did not use smaller parts and more dangerous materials, it would have had less incentive to conduct the recall operation since the lower profit margins would increase the marginal cost of the recall.

What could Iraq look like if we all just left?

Oddly enough, the story of Somalia after the UN withdrew (but before it returned in recent years) shows that power vacuums aren't always to the detriment of society. Of course, the situation in Iraq has significant differences from Somalia- most importantly that a Shiite-dominated centralized government (backed by powerful militias) would at least nominally exist if everyone left. As a result, we would not be leaving behind a true power vacuum, meaning that the group with control of the government apparatus would hold an important advantage over the other groups. This advantage would be enough that the other groups, especially the Sunnis, would have a huge incentive to undermine the government as much as possible, effectively resulting in a civil war.

On the other hand, if we were to combine our withdrawal of forces with an end to most or all international aid to the Maliki government, we would minimize the initial advantage to the Shiites of maintaining a violent grasp on power - in other words, they'd be a government with no money other than what they could get from Iran. As Hamas found out, controlling a government with no money is about as worthwhile as being President of your middle school student council. Indeed, you can't even pay goons to go out and extract money for taxes since they would have no incentive to actually give the money they extract to you.

The only way to make holding on to power worthwhile would be to attract private investors. Even though private investors would love to tap into Iraq's oil, the instability created by a government with no ability to enforce property rights would make access to the oil worthless. Thus, the Shiite government would have no choice but to make peace with the Sunnis, who would find themselves with a surprising amount of leverage to work out a fair deal.

If the government and Sunnis failed to reach an agreement, you would have a state of anarchy - but one very similar to the Somalia example. Of course, the key to all this is that the withdrawal be combined with a complete end to international aid; unfortunately, this is something that most liberals would be completely opposed to on a false belief that the aid would be necessary to prevent a long-term humanitarian crisis.

"Green" Energy policy starves the poor

It seems I am about 3 months late on this topic, but it is one of the greatest ever examples of how government intervention has horrible unintended consequences. One of the more successful purportedly "Green" campaigns in recent years has been the campaign to mandate use of biofuels. As a result of this campaign, governments all over the world have begun to subsidize biofuel production and/or mandate the use of a specific percentage of biofuels in various energy products. Unfortunately, the laws of economics turn out to be more ironclad than the politicians expected.
Importantly, the agricultural products that form the basis for biofuels are all what we might call staples: sugar cane, corn, maize (used mostly for livestock feed), and wheat. What politicians seem to have forgotten (or maybe they just flunked Econ 101 in college) is that you can't artificially increase demand for a scarce resource without an inevitable price increase for that product. In this case, it's even worse, though, because you also have subsidies for particular varieties of agricultural products - but only to the extent the product is used for biofuels. So, farmers suddenly have an incentive to only sell their crops for biofuel uses, resulting in not only increased overall demand, but also a decreased supply in the food market.
Not surprisingly, the subsidies and mandates have resulted in increased global prices for these crops. The price of maize more than doubled between Jan. 2006 and May 2007. Maize is considered the world's most important staple crop since it is an essential ingredient in hundreds of foods, and is a primary source of livestock feed. The price doubling came despite the fact that the biofuel maize production amounted to only 15% of the US maize crop. In addition, the government subsidy not surprisingly resulted in less planting of other staple crops, resulting in higher prices for those crops.
A doubling of maize prices was directly responsible for a sizable increase in the overall price of US food in early 2007. But the effects on Second and Third World countries have been huge. For example, in 2006, according to Foreign Affairs, tortilla prices in Mexico more than doubled. Corn prices and wheat prices increased by at least 50% between June 2006 and 2007.
A 30% global increase in the price of wheat this year alone - due largely to biofuel production - has resulted in Italians going on strike today against eating pasta, which has seen its price rise accordingly.
Sugarcane, soybeans, and other staples have seen their prices rise accordingly- all as a direct result of biofuels production. Since these foods are all staple foods, the most affected by the price increase are the world's poorest countries. The problem has gotten so bad that within 20 years, some estimates suggest biofuel production will result in twice as many individuals who are "chronically hungry" worldwide as would otherwise be so classified. This increase amounts to 600 million additional starving people - but at least we'll be able to feel a little more smug that we helped the environment in a marginal way.

Lou Dobbs, China, and "Idiot Libertarians"

So, I accidentally turned Lou Dobbs on for exactly one minute this afternoon. He was talking about the Chinese toy and food import "scandals" that were in the news over the summer. After ranting about Mattel's corporate greed, he then went into a diatribe against free marketers, asking where are the "free marketers and libertarians now?" regarding this whole Chinese import debate. Continuing his rant, he stated that the whole scandal should prove to "idiot libertarians" that government regulation of trade is necessary to protect the safety of the American people. Finally, he drew the connection - as usual - between corporations and their ability to influence government in order to screw the consumer.

I did some research and found that, indeed, the libertarian movement has been less than concerned about the China toy recalls. Most libertarian commentary on the issue has discussed it only tangentially discussing other issues of China trade policy. Of course, the reason for this silence is mostly because libertarians aren't overly concerned with toy "defects" that have apparently caused little or no actual harm to US consumers (so far as I can tell).
Nonetheless, I figured that I will answer Mr. Dobbs' challenge (since I'm sure he's a regular reader of Publius Endures).
So, here are 6 reasons why the Chinese toy recalls do not represent a failure of the free market:
1. As far as I have been able to tell, the tens of millions of recalled toys that Dobbs complained about have resulted in exactly zero reported injuries. Indeed, the Consumer Products Safety Commission, in the most recent round of recalls, indicated that no injuries have occurred as a result of the allegedly defective products. So, I can't see how the market has created an unacceptable danger to the consumer if tens of millions of the toys subject to the recalls have caused exactly zero harm, or at least such a low level of harm as to be statistically irrelevant.
2. The fact that US government rules have apparently been violated in terms of the materials contained in the products is not in itself proof of a market failure and of the need for stronger government rules. If rules had been followed, and a statistically significant number of injuries had resulted nonetheless, then one could say there was a market failure and new rules could be justified. But the fact that rules have been broken does not justify stricter rules.
3. In fact, since many millions of products were imported and sold in violation of the government's rules and few if any injuries resulted over a substantial period of time, the evidence would suggest that the government regulation is either far more strict than necessary or is totally without value. This means that the only possible reasons for the rules are either to act as a means of protectionism for US manufacturers or they are completely arbitrary since the government lacks the ability to precisely set its standards at the most economically efficient point.
4. Dobbs' ad hominem attack on libertarians clearly shows his absolute ignorance of fundamental libertarian and free market principals. Most importantly, it ignores the fact that a true free market approach opposes corporate welfare just as vehemently as it opposes social welfare programs. Corporate welfare such as government subsidies, special tax breaks, and - most importantly for these purposes - limitations on liability are completely anti-free market. Obviously, corporate welfare significantly reduces the economic incentives to provide a safe product for the consumer since the government policies artificially reduce the corporation's marginal costs for defective products. Corporate legal protections and subsidies diffuse liability costs amongst the entire company rather than on a handful of individuals with a personal stake in the company. As a result, a corporate decisionmaker will only see his earnings reduced by a comparatively small amount if the company is found liable for defective products; without corporate welfare, that individual might be personally liable for all legal damages.
5. The fact that the products in these cases were recalled despite a lack of any significant injuries actually suggests a market success rather than a market failure. Even in the case of the dog food recall fiasco, only a few dozen of the millions upon millions of dogs that had eaten the "tainted" food wound up dying or with permanent health problems- the risk of serious injury was statistically only slightly higher than the chances of winning the lottery. Most -if not all- of the relevant toy and food recalls were voluntary, despite absurdly high costs to the companies. This means that the companies involved were concerned about permanent or long term damage to their consumer image in the unlikely event of injuries occuring. The recalls, by and large, were not the result of government enforcement, then, but of the profit motive.
6. Tariffs. I don't know what, if any, tariffs were involved in the questioned imports. However, the existence of the tariffs has a perverse effect on market incentives. A realistic hypothetical can demonstrate how this is relevant: ABC Co. currently makes a particular product in the US; however, the cost of producing the product in the US is increasing, but demand for the product will not support a correspondingly higher retail price. ABC Co. also knows that, for a variety of reasons, it can produce this product for much less in China and keep its price at current levels or even less. Therefore, it agrees with a Chinese company to produce the product in China at a particular price. Suddenly, however, a tariff is put in place or an existing tariff increases. This creates an increase in production cost to ABC Co. However, it still must keep its retail price point the same. As a result, ABC Co. must choose between either discontinuing the product or obtaining a lower price from the Chinese manufacturer. If ABC Co. chooses to pursue a lower price from the Chinese manufacturer, that manufacturer will almost certainly have to choose between ending its production of the product or finding a cheaper way of producing the product - including, perhaps, lower quality materials.

Having proven that the "unsafe" Chinese imports are not a market failure but a failure of too much regulation, I would like to suggest that Mr. Dobbs take a refresher course on free-market economics. Hazlitt's "Economics in One Lesson" should do the trick.

Romney Didn't Say That, Did He?

From the debate tonight:

"And I hear from time to time people say, hey, wait a second. We have civil liberties we have to worry about. But don't forget, the most important civil liberty I expect from my government is my right to be kept alive, and that's what we're going to have to do." - Mitt "Battlefield Earth" Romney

I know this sounds great to those who call themselves conservatives nowadays, but really this is a blatant justification of authoritarianism/totalitarianism. Indeed, it was the underlying (if sometimes unspoken) justification for every authoritarian or totalitarian government action in history.

If the right to be kept alive by the government is the single most important civil liberty, then there are no other civil liberties. If the government's primary job is keeping people alive, then anything which can be potentially perceived as dangerous to life can be prohibited: "dangerous" speech, "dangerous" press coverage, the habeas corpus rights of "dangerous prisoners" held without trial, "dangerous" property rights like the right to buy or sell "dangerous" products (ie, guns, drugs, cigarettes, McDonald's, etc.). And this says nothing of the socialist implications of Romney's statement, since the "right to be kept alive" by the government necessarily implies that the government must provide its citizens free healthcare, free food, free water, and free anything that would tend to lengthen an individual's life.

Freedom IS Free

After 9/11, self-titled "conservatives" frequently liked to use the phrase "freedom isn't free," or talk about the "Cost of Freedom" as justification for sacrificing civil liberties in the name of so-called national security. It's time that this silly, self-contradictory exercise in Orwellian doublethink was put to rest.

The fact is that freedom IS free - it is the restriction of freedom that costs money and lives. For instance - freedom of speech and freedom of the press cost not a penny in a truly free society; the only cost of these freedoms is that of burnt calories from exercising one's mouth and mind, or that of the printing press. But when government regulates those freedoms, the cost is very real, not just because of the marginal loss of freedom but also because someone has to pay to enforce the regulation of those freedoms by the FCC, Secret Service, etc. We call those costs taxes. When we restrict guns and declare war on drugs, those restrictions cost money to enforce, not to mention lost freedoms in terms of civil liberties, lost production due to an excessive prison population, increased costs of imprisonment, shifted resources from more pressing priorities, etc.

Of course the foundation of the claim that "freedom isn't free" is that freedom must be protected by a strong national defense, characterized by a strong military, heightened surveillance by law enforcement, and "dirty" tactics by our intelligence agencies, and restricted due process rights. I will deal with the military question last, but the biggest problem is the assumption that these three things actually protect freedom. This assumption is faulty because all of these (particularly the last three) actually restrict freedom quite severely. The assumption thus becomes, in effect, that we must kill freedom in order to save it- a horrible case of doublethink. And this says nothing of the monetary and unintended consequences of these increased government powers.

As for the need for a strong military, it is difficult to argue that some form of national defense/public law enforcement is unnecessary. Legendary anarcho-capitalist Murray Rothbard famously made an attempt at such an argument, but I think he falls short because I am unconvinced that private security firms would have adequate incentive to avoid war with each other; a constant turf war amongst private security firms would be, in effect, the current state of Iraq or 1990-present Somalia. Thus, a publicly-funded military with constitutional restrictions is by far the lesser of two evils. Even if necessary, though, the existence of a taxpayer-funded military still requires coerced tax payments by the government and is thus a restriction on freedom. If it is a restriction on freedom, then by definition it cannot be a protection of freedom, and thus it is not a cost of freedom but a cost of regulation.


Even if the coercive payment of taxes for national defense is not a restriction of freedom, a national military offensive or occupation of a foreign country is most certainly not an actual cost of freedom. To engage in an offensive or to occupy a sovereign country is inherently to act to restrict freedom in that country because offensive military force is the most violently coervice action in which one can engage. Some would say that it is the freedom of the other country that we are restricting, rather than our own. This is true as far as it goes, but ignores other consequences:

1. "Blowback"- restriction of other people's freedom by coercive aggression creates an understandable justification for the victims of that aggression to act aggressively towards us (resulting in increased needs for law enforcement and defensive military posturing on our part).

2. It is impossible to be simultaneously free and justify the restriction of other people's freedom. To do so ultimately requires doublethink or an acceptance of restrictions on one's own freedoms (or at least that of their countrymen).

3. Most importantly, it implicitly assumes that freedom is not a human birthright, but is instead a birthright only of those fortunate enough to be born in a particular nation.


To the extent that governments are necessary (and they unfortunately are), we are deluding ourselves in thinking that even necessary government functions actually protect freedom when those functions still rely on coercive tax payment or regulation of individual behavior. The fact of the matter is that if (and only if) government did not exist at all, humans would be completely free- freedom does not need protection, and thus does not have a cost as defined by the Fox News Republicans.

Ultimately, when someone claims that freedom isn't free, they are really making the self-evident claim that the American system of government isn't free. But just because American-style government allows for more freedoms than most doesn't make it synonymous with freedom.

Not since Reagan and Thatcher...

In the last 20 years, has there been a nationally elected leader in any country who has been willing to say something like this (from the President of Georgia, per an article in the WSJ):

"A day or two later, at a dinner for Georgian businessmen, the president delivers a speech hammering home his well-honed message of self-help. "The government is going to help you in the best way possible, by doing nothing for you, by getting out of your way. Well, I exaggerate but you understand. Of course we will provide you with infrastructure, and help by getting rid of corruption, but you have all succeeded by your own initiative and enterprise, so you should congratulate yourselves."Mr. Saakashvili's style of leadership feels like a permanent political campaign -- which it is, in a way. He seems determined to show citizens how it's being done, visibly to demonstrate accountability, transparency and political process, so they grow accustomed to the sight of politicians answering to them -- in short, to Western political habits. All the while, he's exhorting and explaining, striving to change attitudes ingrained through decades of Soviet rule and 15 years of stagnation, strife and corruption. "I keep telling people that this is not a process like some silver-backed gorilla leading them to new pastures. They must do it themselves, and they are."" (emphasis added).

Junk Science and Global Warming?

First, let me say that I am still waiting to be convinced by either side in the global warming debate. However, there were two stories that (shockingly!) were ignored or downplayed in the MSM that cast serious doubt on the validity of much global warming science. First, NASA was forced to revise all of its data on US temperature (which goes back to 1880) due to the fact that a blogger exposed a Y2K glitch in the data; there are apparently several other possible flaws that could result in further revisions. The newly revised data are here; more context is here. You will be interested to know that as a result of this first revision, 1998 is now only the second warmest year in the last century. Of the top 10 warmest years, 4 are in the 1930s, and 3 between 1998 and today.

It is my understanding that the NASA data are about the most widely used in terms of providing a basis for the argument that the globe is in fact warming in an unusual manner. If, in fact, the 1930s were warmer than the last decade, though, then the temperatures during the last decade could not possibly be conclusive or even particularly useful evidence of global warming.

The second story that has been pretty much ignored is that British government scientists have acknowledged that they overestimated the effects of global warming in recent years, and probably through 2008 as well. BUT, they claim, it will begin in earnest in 2009. Apparently, the previous climate models "underestimate the effects of natural forces on climate change." (That's right, the models of natural forces were inaccurate because they failed to account for natural forces!). As a result of these unanticipated "natural forces" the scientists simply changed their climate model slightly instead of first checking their premises; now, supposedly, the forecast is iron-clad. (A spin-doctored version of this story is also available from Reuters- without all that messy stuff about the previous version being wrong - or even existing - of course.)

Like I said, though - I'm still on the fence about this whole business...but it becomes very difficult to accept the arguments that man-made global warming is an indisputable fact when the data behind those arguments suffer from Y2K flaws and failures to account for the effects of natural forces when trying to make a model of natural forces.

Phrase of the Moment Feature

Not that anyone cares but me, but I've added a little section I am calling the "Moment's Statement of Freedom." The idea is that true libertarianism can be boiled down to one short sentence - it's just that there are a nearly infinite number of ways to express that sentence. Whenever I update I'm hoping to change the statement. For the first statement, I decided to use an old familiar standby.

Med-Mal/Healthcare

Of course the culture of medical malpractice suits plays a role in all of this. However, I would argue that the sizable presence of med-mal is itself a result of the increased regulation of the healthcare industry. Also, as NL pointed out, Med-Mal suits have pretty much declined slightly or leveled off in the last 10 years or so (although that is at least partly the result of “reforms” on the state level):

1. The increased regulation makes it relatively easy for a plaintiff to find a cause of action whenever they are dissatisfied with their care- there are so many regulations that a crafty plaintiff's lawyer can probably find an argument for a regulatory violation in just about any instance. The AMA's own standards and regulations also probably play a big role here.
2. The increased regulation has left the insurance companies in charge of whether a claim (whether for malpractice or additional treatment) is accepted. Since the insurance companies in turn have thousands of their own regulations, they are able to deny many claims at an early stage, creating an incentive to sue rather than just settle right away.
3. I don't know that punitive damages are usually allowed in med-mal cases. However, to the extent they are permitted, they are most often creatures of statute or at least outside the realm of traditional common law. Punitive damages destroy the economic calculus, have no connection to the actual harm caused by a defendant, and when aggregated have a significant negative effect on markets.
4. Most importantly, though (and contrary to popular opinion), increased rules and regulations create a diffusion of responsibility in medical practitioners. In other words, the more “one size fits all” rules the profession has to follow, the more the doctors will blindly obey those rules (since failure to do so means automatic liability and possibly loss of license even if no harm is done), and the less they will obey their own sense of reason (since failure to do so only results in payment by the med-mal insurance, and that is only if the patient actually suffers harm as a result; in either event, the doctor keeps his license since it is only a finding of negligence, not a violation of an arbitrary rule). This sort of phenomenon has been discussed not only by libertarians like Rand, but also by all sorts of social psychologists – from Milgram’s electroshock studies to Zimbardo’s Lucifer Effect/Stanford Prison Experiment.

That said, I'm actually opposed to most of the supposed "med-mal" reforms being attempted – for many of the reasons discussed by NL. By placing caps on damages, the government is adopting a "one size fits all" approach. Additionally, in calculating the amount of the caps, the legislature must either engage in socialist-style economic planning and forecasting (something that is either impossible or so prohibitively expensive as to negate the value of the forecast), or simply set an arbitrary figure based on political pull (which is effectively the California Rule). The result in any event is that some, maybe many, legitimate plaintiffs will not be made whole, which will marginally increase burdens in other (less efficient) areas of the healthcare system.

Additionally, legislative attempts to have med-mal cases at least initially removed from the courts to be vetted by a hearing board will also only make matters worse- you can’t fix a problem caused by too much bureaucracy by adding more bureaucracy. In this case, though, you are building higher costs into the system right off the bat; you are often staffing these review boards with other doctors (again introducing “pull” into the system similar to Rand’s “Unification Board”), you still have some form of discovery process, etc. And once the board has made their decision, a losing plaintiff is going to use whatever means they have at their disposal to appeal (more bureaucracy and expense), while a winning plaintiff simply gets the right to go to court and start all over again (meaning that those cases now cost substantially more to try than prior to the reform).

Ultimately, though, attempts at medical malpractice reform are doomed to backfire because they take us even further away from the common law and the judgments of people actually in possession of the facts in any given case. Just as importantly, they are an attempt to solve a problem of over-regulation by over-regulating even more.

As an aside, I actually liked Nolan’s example of the NYC hospital. But the reason I like it is that it was a rational decision made by the individuals who would actually be directly liable in any malpractice suit. Instead of looking to the government for a shield against liability, they chose to do something they probably would have done in a truly free market years ago – take flexible measures aimed solely at increasing factual knowledge of their own business in order to diagnose and correct internal problems. This of course results in fewer claims and increased profits. The problem is that implementing this on a national level takes away the profit incentive because then the program is being run by the government, which will then implement one-size-fits-all approaches to apparent inefficiencies.

Finally, the problem with “Loser Pays” reforms is that they not only make the loser pay for court costs (which are already paid mostly by the Plaintiff), they also make the loser pay the winner’s legal fees. This will destroy the economic calculus since: 1. Hospitals have far more expensive lawyers, whose fees could be up to 50% of the original claim, depending on the claim’s size; and 2. It artificially increases incentives for the Plaintiff to settle for far less than their actual harm since it automatically reduces the value of their claim by making payment of legal fees inevitable. This would be fine if, in fact, every losing Plaintiff were filing frivolously; the problem is that truly frivolous suits almost always get tossed out by the summary judgment phase. A case that actually goes to trial is usually going to be a closely decided case that could come down to any number of different things.

The Health Care "Crisis"

So now that I've fought my way through "Atlas Shrugged" and have grown to understand the extent to which I really am a libertarian (thereby making the title of this blog kind of ironic), I'm starting to see just how far socialism has infected the American experiment. Certainly the worst example of this - with one exception that I dare not name - is health care.
The ongoing debate over healthcare has gotten so infected by socialism that it has become a real-life parody of Atlas Shrugged: the more health care has been regulated, the worse it has gotten, which has resulted in more and more cries for further regulating healthcare until we finally arrive at Michael Moore's socialist utopia of a system (which I think would ultimately result in the complete destruction of medicine). Strangely, I found it very difficult to find a timeline or history of healthcare and healthcare reform in the US., but I finally came across this timeline from PBS' "Healthcare Crisis" program website:
http://www.pbs.org/healthcarecrisis/history.htm

Of course, any timeline for a program based on the concept of a "healthcare crisis" is likely to have a very pro- "reform" agenda. Nonetheless, if you ignore contradictory allegations like:

"Healthcare costs are escalating rapidly, partially due to ...expansion of hospital expenses and profits, (emphasis added)"

you will notice a clear trend emerging.

Specifically, you will notice that the chief complaints about the American heathcare system are: 1. Lack of coverage for many Americans; and more frequently 2. Steadily rising health care costs. According to the timeline, these two problems have only gotten worse as time has gone on, to the point where they are now apparently a "crisis." The timeline appears to suggest that the increase in these problems is a result of insufficient government intervention in the market. This suggestion, however, ignores the fact that the timeline also shows a corresponding increase in healthcare regulation for every increase in healthcare costs and decrease in affordable medical coverage.

For instance, the timeline states that in the 1950s "federal responsibility for the sick poor is firmly established." It then states - without drawing a connection - that during that same time period, the cost of hospital care "doubled," and insurance became unaffordable for those without jobs. Similarly, in the 1960s, the government adopted measure to expand education in the healthcare professions. The timeline then complains - again without drawing a connection - that the percentage of specialists during that decade grew by 14 points.

Prior to the 1950s, the timeline fails to identify a single fact-based problem with the US healthcare system. Indeed, the only problems identified are the allegation that "Rural health facilities are clearly inadequate" (unsupported, but if true it was most likely a result of urbanization), and that "America lags behind Europe in finding value in insuring against the costs of sickness" (a blanket assertion that assumes there is value in making health insurance a government issue). Beginning in the 1950s, the only decade in which the timeline does not raise an issue of dramatically increased costs or decreased access is the decade in which regulation of the industry decreased (ie, the 1980s). What is interesting here, though, is that the timeline would seem to suggest (inadvertently, of course) that the quality of healthcare has decreased in the United States not because of too little government intervention, but because of too much government intervention.

In essence, the more government intervenes in the healthcare market, the worse things become - not just for those able to afford the best medicine, but also for the very people supposed to benefit from the intervention. But rather than blaming the problems on the actual changes in the system, and then revoking those changes, the response has been to say that "well, we just didn't go far enough - doctors and drug companies and hospitals are still making too much money."

Another thing worth noting - a list of medical advances from infoplease.com shows that virtually every single important medical advance in the 20th century arose from doctors in either the United States or Great Britain - and most in the US. It does not appear that the great socialist nations like France or Communist nations were responsible for many - if any - advances in medicine during the 20th century.

Let's try this again!

After an oh-so brief attempt at blogging a while back, I decided to try my hand at things all over again. The idea here is to discuss how current events would be interpreted by the Founding Fathers - or at the very least how to handle the various constitutional dilemmas posed by today's politics, society, and culture.