Category Archives: Economics

Miscellaneous economy stuff

Victory for Competitive Free Market Pricing

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So far, hospitals will be required to publish the prices they negotiate with their insurers. This will facilitate the public’s ability to comparison shop for hospital procedures and services so as to drive down costs to the public through competition.

The American Hospital Association had sued in Federal court to block a new Trump administration rule that required such publication, but the judge presiding, Carl Nichols, granted the government’s motion for summary dismissal.

Aside from withstanding the inevitable sequence of appeals, a significant part of what’s left, now, is a requirement for hospitals to publish their success rates for various types of procedure and service.

The Party of Economic Sense

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A Sunday editorial in The Wall Street Journal provides some pretty dispositive data concerning State economic behaviors during the present Wuhan Virus situation.

The baseline: the national unemployment rate for May was 13.3%.

Ten States remained above even 15% in their individual unemployment rates:

  • Nevada 25.3%
  • Hawaii 22.6%
  • Michigan 21.2%
  • California 16.3%
  • Rhode Island 16.3%
  • Massachusetts 16.3%
  • Delaware 15.8%
  • Illinois 15.2%
  • New Jersey 15.2%
  • Washington 15.1%

These States also had some of our nation’s most draconian lockdown requirements.

States with no lockdown or very light-handed stay-home instructions coupled with very early reopening include these, and their May unemployment rates:

  • Georgia 9.7%
  • Arkansas 9.5%
  • Arizona 8.9%
  • Utah 8.5%
  • Nebraska 5.2% (our nation’s lowest rate)

It’s a nearly pure Progressive-Democrat vs Republican view of the importance of economic health, and so of overall health. As with most things, though, there are a couple of exceptions.

Massachusetts, in that top-ten list of poor performance, has a Republican Governor and Lieutenant Governor, although it has Progressive-Democratic Party veto-proof majorities in both houses of the State’s legislature.

Colorado, Progressive-Democrat-run, isn’t on the list of top-five best performers, but that government ended its lockdown very early, and its unemployment rate is below the national average and falling further: from April’s 12.2% to 10.2% in May.

Notice that. The economic recovery rate is markedly improved by early release from lockdown gaol or by not locking up the citizens in the first place.

Keep in mind who has the better sense—economic, liberty, health—this November.

Errant Satrap

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That’s how the European Union views Great Britain as the EU continues to demand that Great Britain accede to demands they wish to impose on a sovereign nation—solely to bring that subordinate polity to heel. Examples of the EU’s demands:

  • post-Brexit sovereignty to make Britain more competitive via deregulation, environmental rules or tax reform—these must not occur
  • UK’s ability to subsidize industries in line with EU state-aid regulations—this must be curtailed

The first must not be allowed explicitly because of that competition. The second may be bad business overall, but it’s a domestic matter.

And this, regarding tariffs:

new tariff schedule London published last month eliminated levies on some 2,000 goods, or 17% of goods in the schedule, and simplified tariffs on another 40%. Measured by value, 70% of Britain’s imports from other World Trade Organization members will now be tariff-free, compared to 52% under the EU-wide tariff schedule.

Here is the EU’s attempt to prevent British competition.

And the EU’s demands regarding fishing:

bind the UK permanently in EU fisheries rules governing where British and other fishermen can cast their nets. The UK instead wants the same level of sovereignty other coastal countries enjoy to negotiate fishing rights annually.

And that’s the rub: the EU continues to demand to reach into—deep into—British national sovereignty to impose EU governance imperatives on British domestic matters. The EU does not accept Great Britain’s sovereignty.

Every one of those demands individually are deal breakers, and their aggregate demonstrate the EU’s (continued) bad faith in its “negotiations.”

The Brits should walk away from Brussels today and stop wasting their time and effort on the EU’s sham. They have better and more pressing things to do with their resources than negotiating with those who will not.

Troops in Germany

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President Donald Trump has said he intends to reduce the number of American soldiers in Germany.

Germany, he said, is not meeting its commitment to spend 2% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on defense as required by the NATO alliance. Member nations had pledged to reach the 2% threshold by 2024. Germany has said it hopes to reach the target by 2031.

Which is a cynical commitment by Germany, since there will be several generations of German governments over the intervening 11 years.

But here’s the kicker, from Emily Haber, Germany’s Ambassador to the US:

US troops…are not there to defend Germany. They are there to defend the trans-Atlantic security. They are also there to project American power in Africa, in Asia[.]

If that’s true—or if it’s the case that Germany is dictating to us our purpose in keeping troops stationed there (not so outlandish; Germany is, after all a sovereign nation, not a post-war occupied one)—there’s even less reason to keep troops stationed there.

We can defend trans-Atlantic security much more efficiently from any of a number of other European, and Atlantic, nations. We can project power “in Africa” much more efficiently from any of a number of other European, African, Western Asian nations. We can project power “in Asia” much more efficiently from any of a number of Pacific nations.

And we would be doing those power projections much more securely than by putting all of our security eggs in a single German basket.

We also can fulfill our own NATO commitments much more effectively and overtly with those German-stationed troops redeployed to northern and eastern European nations, nations who still care about their own and their mutual defense, nations who still remember an existence under Soviet Russian occupation.

In the end, as I wrote earlier, Germany’s angst has nothing to do with defense—about which the nation seems to have little interest—and has much to do with the potential loss of all of those millions of American dollars spent on the German economy by tens of thousands of American military family members and by the soldiers themselves.

Were Germany interested in anything else, it would meet its voluntarily entered into commitment of 2% of its GDP for defense without any of its…delays.

More Federal Money to States and Locals?

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The “unrest” sparked by the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, and now by the killing of Rayshard Brooks in Atlanta, is encouraging Congressmen to include increased funding for State and local jurisdictions in any “next stimulus” package that might be in the offing.

States and cities facing budget shortfalls have warned they might need to pare back spending on public safety, including police officers and fire protection.

“Including police officers and fire protection” is a cynical excuse for spending yet more OPM.

State and local jurisdictions aren’t effectively using the Federal monies they’re being given now, though. This is demonstrated by the rioting, looting, bad policeman (not bad police force) incidents that continue to proceed with no, or too slow, consequences.

There’s no need to throw more Federal money—more money from the taxpayers of other jurisdictions—down those ratholes until they start cleaning up their own messes.