September 24, 2007 by Tom Armstrong.

Short, splendid article on Hillarycare 2007.

Posted in General post | No Comments »

September 24, 2007 by Tom Armstrong.

Don Boudreaux of Cafe Hayek posts this letter today (Sept 24, 2007).

Posted in General post | No Comments »

September 24, 2007 by Tom Armstrong.

Consider reading this opinion in today’s journal, which begins:

If Jon Corzine is the new Henry David Thoreau, then civil disobedience has been defined down. The New Jersey Governor is winning accolades for his defiance of the Bush Administration’s rules for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. How fitting that Mr. Corzine should be the one to resort to lawbreaking, given that his state exemplifies everything that’s gone haywire with Schip.

Schip was created in 1997 to help insure children from low-income families, but it has since become a stealth vehicle to expand government control of health care. Schip expires next week, and House and Senate negotiators are hashing out a “compromise” that would expand the program by about $35 billion over the next five years (plus a budget gimmick concealing at least $30 billion).

President Bush reiterated his veto threat last week, not least because the $5 billion expansion he supports would pick up the remaining 689,000 uninsured kids that Schip was intended to serve. By contrast, Democrats want to expand Schip well beyond the original boundaries — households at or below 200% of the federal poverty line, or $41,300 for a family of four — and make it a middle-class entitlement. Many states like New Jersey have been taking advantage of Schip’s “flexibility” and covering more affluent children, their parents, and even childless adults.

In a tardy response to this trend, the federal Department of Health and Human Services announced in August that before states could further expand their Schip programs beyond 250% of poverty, they would have to enroll 95% of children below 200% of poverty. This limit moves the most disadvantaged children to the head of the line, before subsidizing those who need it less. In practice, it also checks Schip’s mission creep. Such directives are a legitimate tool that all Administrations use to shape policy.

The usual liberal precincts claim to be enraged. Governor Corzine declared that New Jersey would unilaterally disregard the HHS rules and “vigorously continue” to enroll at 350% of poverty — the highest ceiling in the country. And he’d do so even though about 119,000 New Jersey children under 200% of the poverty line remain uninsured — and although the state spends 43% of its yearly Schip grant insuring adults.

For several years the number of uninsured New Jersey children under 200% has held steady, while New Jersey’s Schip rolls have grown by about 10% a year. One major reason is that the state continues to enroll families with incomes up to $72,275. What’s more, this public coverage is mostly substituting for the private variety. A recent working paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research estimates the crowd-out for Schip at 60%, meaning that in order to cover four new kids the government is paying for six more who already had private insurance. This effect is even more pronounced at higher income levels: Nationally, 89% of children between 300% and 400% already have private coverage.

…

It ends with this admission:

And soon enough, every state may become New Jersey. As Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus recently noted, “I think the Children’s Health Insurance Program is another step to move toward universal coverage. Everyone realizes that the goal of this legislation moves us a giant step further down the road to nationalizing health care.” At least Mr. Baucus isn’t disguising his socialist goal, unlike Mr. Corzine.

With his veto pledge, Mr. Bush is trying to hold Schip to something close to its original intent. We hope enough Republicans appreciate the policy stakes to sustain it.

Posted in General post | No Comments »

September 24, 2007 by Tom Armstrong.

Here is my letter to the editor in today’s WSJ, which I posted here first on Sept. 19, 2007.

Posted in General post | No Comments »