Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
‘I’ll let you know as soon as I can, Danglars. I shall try to speak to Monsieur de Villefort and intercede with him on the prisoner’s behalf. I know that he is a rabid Royalist; but, dammit, though he’s a Royalist and a crown prosecutor, he is also a man and not, I believe, a…
“The first customers bough pairs of telephones for communication point to point: between a factory and its business office, for example. Queen Victory installed one at Windsor Castle and one at Buckingham Palace (fabricated in ivory; a gift from the savvy [Alexander Graham] Bell.” from The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood by James…
Medicare is a government-run insurance program. Can policy changes be made to add competition to Medicare, maintain quality and reduce cost? A book titled Bring Market Prices to Medicare argues that it can through a competitive bidding process. This book makes a number of sensible arguments which I review today. The main proposal of the…
I recently finished reading a great book by William Bynum called The History of Medicine: A Very Short Introduction. The book does just what it says: provides a great introduction to the history of medicine. It is concise and interesting throughout. The contents are divided into six chapters: Medicine at the bedside Medicine in the…
“All tobacco companies are state-owned, and the industry provides signifiant revenue; it also directly employs more than half a million people. From the government’s perspective, smoking is important to stability, both economic and social. Some cigarettes are even subsidized–the cheapest brands cost as little as thirty cents a pack, because officials fear that farmers will…
Why would that be the case? The answer is risk. Poor people (especially in developing countries) have a larger share of their assets at risk due to theft, a family illness, or funeral. Thus, cash flow management is vital for survival for the poor. The Enlightened Economist discusses a book called Portfolios of the Poor…
The theory behind Wikipedia is that the wisdom of the masses is greater than that of a few ‘experts’. Many people believe that Wikipedia has greatly enhanced the amount of knowledge available to the common man. Others lament that the encyclopedia entries are not always screen and the quality of entries is highly variable. Can…
The Drunkard’s Walk is not about drinking. Instead, as the subtitle states, the book discusses ‘How Randomness Rules our Lives.’ Although I personally didn’t enjoy this book, I highly recommend it to most people. There are two categories of people who should not read this book: economists (me) statisticians, or mathematicians. These people will likely…
“If you’ve seen one Medicaid program, you’ve seen one Medicaid program.” This week, I will review some of the findings from a wonderful book titled The Politics of Medicaid. Author Laura Katz Olson writes a well-researched book that evaluates Medicaid from the points of view of its various stakeholders including beneficiaries, providers (esp., physicians and…
What is the history of financial crises? Why to they occur? Are they common? In the book This Time is Different, authors Reinhard and Rogoff assiduously review the history of government defaults and crisis of the financial system. Their data on government default is truly astounding. They document instance of government default in multiple ways:…