Friday, April 08, 2011

More Economic Healthcare Political Stuff

I don't know whether to believe any of this or not but Karl Smith says Making the Ryan Economic Assumptions Work "I should note that every single one of these projections is utterly possible and indeed internally consistent. Paul Ryan and Heritage are implicitly assuming a repeal of US immigration restrictions."

Mathew Yglesias says Paul Ryan’s Budget Is Justified By Implausible Projections, But Doesn’t Rely On Them. "Ryan’s proposals are all oriented around shares of GDP. On taxes, for example, he proposes cuts in the income tax rates paid by high-income people and then stipulates that total revenue will nonetheless equal the Bush share of GDP via a mysterious middle class tax increase. Similarly, what he does with Medicare is first privatize it, and then stipulate that the private vouchers will grow at the rate of general inflation plus one percent. Under that plan, Medicare spending as a share of GDP shrinks by definition."

"The math of this part of his agenda is totally impeccable. What’s deficient is the public policy and this is where Heritage’s bad math kicks in. After all, why would you enact this crazy agenda? Now in the case of Paul Ryan the answer is pretty clear—he’s an Ayn Rand fanatic who believes that any effort, whether public or private, to help the poor is immoral. But it’s difficult to sell that as a political agenda! So instead his argument is that we should do it for the macroeconomic benefits. What benefits? Well, the benefits the Heritage Foundation is pretending the plan will have."

Ryan's plan is title "Path to Prosperity" but chuck Marr of CBPP says it's that Just for the Wealthy and is a cruel joke. "For the wealthy, Ryan’s proposals are pure gold...But for working families, whose living standards have stagnated in recent decades, Ryan’s plan seems designed to make it harder for them to help their children have a better life." He gives some examples, but also this graph:

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Mathew Yglesias points out what to me seems obvious but he has a graph that should be convincing to anyone. Closing The Deficit By Creating Jobs.

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Ezra Klein gives Some guidelines for controlling health-care costs

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