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By Ryan, February 16, 2010 3:31 pm

I’m not sure what to make of the Tea Party in the long term.  While I agree mostly with their low-taxes and small-government opinions, it is clear that they are the wacky people of the conservative movement.  When a private market is not yielding desirable outcomes (markets that don’t meet 1 or more of the requirements for a perfectly efficient market) a government (of the people, by the people, and for the people) has a strong case for intervention.  When our country started, no private enterprise could be trusted to deliver mail across our vast borders.   As a result, our government started the United States Postal Service which now – 200+ years later – competes with UPS, FedEx, and DHL.  This is a market where costs are competitive, the service is reliable and there are options to choose from.  Education is the same thing.  The existence of public universities has no negative affect on private universities ability to innovate and teach.  The point I’m trying to make is that right now we need the government to step in and correct the shortfalls of our healthcare industry.  Right now we need the government to step in and correct the shortfalls of our energy industry (by forcing companies to internalize the cost of polluting our atmosphere).  This does not mean a government take-over!  When has the US government EVER gone into a healthy private industry and took control of it?  Even industries that the government has largely controlled in the past (postal service, some municipalities) it opens up to private markets.

These are a few paths ahead I see for the Tea Party:

1) The vocal minority (which the Tea Party is) will steer the Republican party towards ever-more conservative values (both fiscally and socially) at the cost of independent voters and non-partisanship in our government.

2) The Tea Party will split the Republican party in two.  This may not be such a bad thing because there are a lot of independents, myself included, that are fiscally conservative and socially liberal.  (I support government expansion in the short term to stave off a depression.  I support government intervention to remedy vital market failures.  I also support low taxes and generally small governments in the medium and long term.)

3) The Tea Party will rise to some sort of prominence in politics (probably under the Republican umbrella) and will continue on a path of low taxes and large, unfunded government expansion (look at Bush’s tax cuts to the rich, two unfunded wars and his costly, unfunded Medicare expansion).  All this while rolling back socially progressive movements (gays openly serving in the military, gay marriage laws, environmental regulations, education programs, R&D in green-tech & bioscience, etc.)

4) Obama will pursue his agenda (which I agree with) and get a decent health care bill passed, a decent climate change bill passed and some decent education reforms passed and the country is better for it.  All of the wild claims about death panels and the like will be revealed for what they are and the Tea Party movement will be discredited and will shrink or largely fade away.

There are problems that need addressing and it doesn’t do anybody any good to resist compromise…or change.

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By Ryan, October 10, 2009 8:39 pm

Personally, I thought that Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize was out of left field but what I think is more interesting is how the Republican party is reacting to it. In a fundraising message, Michael Steele (the Republican National Committee chief) wrote the following:

“The Democrats and their international leftist allies want America made subservient to the agenda of global redistribution and control,” Steele wrote. “And truly patriotic Americans like you and our Republican Party are the only thing standing in their way.”
http://features.csmonitor.com/politics/2009/10/10/gops-michael-steele-tries-to-make-money-from-obamas-nobel-prize/

And Rush Limbaugh said this regarding Obama’s award:

“Folks, do you realize something has happened here that we all agree with the Taliban and Iran about and that is he doesn’t deserve the award,” he said. “Now that’s hilarious, that I’m on the same side of something with the Taliban, and that we all are on the same side as the Taliban.”

So the Republican part is both saying that the Obama administration’s “leftist” allies (read: Europe) are on his side while the Taliban and Iran are on the Republican’s side. Let me get this straight: the U.S.’s strongest allies agree with the Democrats while the GOP is touting that they agree with our enemies? They have to see the disconnect, right?

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By Ryan, August 5, 2009 6:12 pm

I’ve been reading a lot about healthcare in the U.S. recently and have come up with a few thoughts. First of all, let me tell you that I tend to be fiscally conservative but socially liberal. This makes the U.S. healthcare debate interesting for me because I like the idea of near-universal healthcare but I don’t like the idea of government-run healthcare both for costs and bureaucracy (I majored in Economics, after all…) On top of that, I am in a position where I have a pre-existing condition (almost 5 years in remission!) that makes health insurance either prohibitavely expensive or not available at all to me. On top of that I am a self-employed, small business owner so there’s really no hope of me getting insurance through my business. Let me first talk about what I like about a government health insurance provider:

Size
A government-run program would benefit by having a large pool of people to help offset the costs of caring for the sick. How the system is set up now with private insurers is the pool of insurance-holders is becoming smaller and sicker. See, every time premiums go up a certain amount of *healthy* people leave because their insurance is no longer worth the amount they are paying. This leaves a smaller pool of people left within the system that are either wealthy or so dependent on medical care that they can’t afford NOT to have insurance. This feedback will happen pretty indefinitely until health insurance can only be attained by the very affluent.

Accountability
Private insurance companies have only one goal: to maximize profits to please shareholders. This is crummy for the people being insured because their insurance has an incentive to get out of any health care costs you incur. A government program could be set up to provide care for people regardless of pre-existing conditions, family history, or any number of unavoidable health issues. Again, so long as the pool of people involved is large enough, the system should be sustainable.

What am I concerned about?…

Bureaucracy
I’ve worked for city government so let me tell you something you already know: red-tape in government is extremely stifling. So much money goes towards bureaucracy that costs are typically much higher than in private enterprise. Also, there are so many rigid rules that I imagine a lot of people will fall through the cracks of the system. Long lines and mediocre care are a concern (though I think an avoidable one.)

Politics
Populism and special interests run ramped in Washington and are rarely in the nation’s best interest. On top of that, many politicians get cold feet when having to make tough decisions, even if it’s the right one. That is certainly not the mentality we want in the health care industry (which is ~1/7th of our economy, btw.)

So what do I think will work? I like the idea of health coops because they are accountable to the right people: you, the person paying for health insurance. NOT shareholders who are more concerned with returns on investment. I think if we set up the system correctly, we could shift incentives and have the best of free-market efficiency and government accountability.

Imagine a government health insurance “company” that contracts out the service side of the industry to countless coops throughout the country. You could have coops as small (local church coop) or as large (state of California coop) as you’d like and still take advantage of a nationwide pool. The government could set the minimum insurance rate and each coop could add onto it as they see fit. Maybe you join the “Typists Coop” that has especially good treatment for carpal tunnel syndrome or maybe you join the “Organic, New-Age Coop” that specializes in alternative treatments or maybe you join the “National Gym Coop” that specializes in preventative care and gives discounted gym memberships. Whatever niche you’re apart of, there would be a coop for you (in theory). Had a bad experience with coop A? Sign up for coop B tomorrow without any hassle since they are all under the government umbrella. The only thing the government would be in charge of would be to provide start-up money and ensure that all coops are following whatever guidelines the government sets forth.

Those are my thoughts, any how.