Dean Baker: Deficit Reduction: The Great Distraction
When we hear Erskine Bowles and his friends rant about the deficit this week, we should remember that once again they are distracting the public from the country's real problems. And this crew is at the center of those problems; it is not the solution.
Dean Baker: Bernie Sanders Advocates a Free Market in AIDS Drugs
There are more efficient mechanisms than patent monopolies to finance drug research. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is proposing one such mechanism, a prize system, be adopted to support research on AIDS drugs.
Dean Baker: Mitt Romney’s Partner in Crime: Ed Conrad’s Unintended Consequences
It's standard practice during the election campaign for presidential candidates to publish an autobiographical account of their rise to stardom or their philosophy of life and politics. It seems that Mitt Romney has outsourced this task to Ed Conrad, one of his former partners at Bain Capital.
Dean Baker: Budget Bunk: The Old Pox on Both Your Houses Game
The economy did not regain the jobs lost in the 2001 recession until 2005, and even then it was on the back of another unsustainable bubble, this one in the housing market. And we know how that one ended.
Dean Baker: Shareholders Say No on Citigroup CEO Pay
Can the members of Citigroup's board say with a straight face that they represented shareholders' interests when they approved Pandit's $14.9 million pay package? Can they say they earned the $250,000 the company paid them this year?
Dean Baker: The Son of the Housing Bubble: First-Time Homebuyers Tax Credit
It's often said that the difference between the powerful and the powerless is that the powerful get to walk away from their mistakes while the powerless suffer the consequences. The first-time homebuyers' tax credit provides an excellent example of the privilege of the powerful.
Dean Baker: The War on Public Sector Workers
Politicians across the country are using heaping doses of the politics of envy to try to arouse the anger of workers. However, their targets are...
Dean Baker: Obama and Romney Are Politicians, Not Visionaries
President Obama and Governor Romney are politicians, not philosophers. They have not made it to the top of the political ladder because of their grand visions of the future. They got their positions by appealing to powerful political actors.
Dean Baker: The Supreme Scream: Obamacare After the Court Ruling
Perhaps a defeat in the Supreme Court will lead to a newly energized public that will demand that their representatives in Congress clean up the health care system and give us universal Medicare. That would be great, but it is difficult to see it happening.
Dean Baker: Medicare Costs Too Much and They Better Not Cut It
Let Medicare beneficiaries buy into the health care systems of other countries, splitting the enormous savings with the government. If the Republicans really supported free markets, they would be all for that one.
Dean Baker: Affirmative Action for School Reformers?
The rich and powerful have lined up firmly on the side of school reform, which is defined as a system where teachers lack job security and standardized testing becomes all-important.
Dean Baker: Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy and the Bowles-Simpson Commission Report
Parents often find it useful to tell their children about non-existent creatures to instill habits of good behavior. It seems that many political leaders are going the same route.
