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242. Does Barack Obama Support Socialized Medicine?
- Author:
- Michael F. Cannon
- Publication Date:
- 10-2008
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Cato Institute
- Abstract:
- Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama (IL) has proposed an ambitious plan to restructure America's health care sector. Rather than engage in a detailed critique of Obama's health care plan, many critics prefer to label it "socialized medicine." Is that a fair description of the Obama plan and similar plans? Over the past year, prominent media outlets and respectable think tanks have investigated that question and come to a unanimous answer: no.
- Topic:
- Economics, Government, Health, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- United States
243. Can America Still Lead in the Global Economy?
- Author:
- Lael Brainard and David Lipton
- Publication Date:
- 08-2008
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- From the vantage point of 2008, some of the most memorable initiatives of U.S. international economic leadership—the Paris and Louvre Accords, the support for Poland and Russia after the fall of communism, the Uruguay Round, and the Mexican Financing Loan—seem like quaint reminders of a simpler time. In the coming years, the exercise of international economic leadership will surely prove more complex than in the past. The very success of the American vision of a global spread of vibrant and competitive markets has created a huge, rapidly integrating private economy of trade and finance much less amenable to guidance, let alone control, by governments. Unlike in diplomacy and defense, where non state actors are growing in importance but still a side show, in inter- national economics, households, corporations, labor unions, and non-profits are now the dominant players in most parts of the world. While they respond to national laws and policies, their interests are varied and their operations often span borders.
- Topic:
- Economics, International Political Economy, International Trade and Finance, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- Russia, United States, Paris, Poland, Uruguay, and Mexico
244. Anatomy of a Train Wreck: Causes of the Mortgage Meltdown
- Author:
- Stan J. Liebowitz
- Publication Date:
- 10-2008
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Independent Institute
- Abstract:
- Why did the mortgage market melt down so badly? Why were there so many defaults when the economy was not particularly weak? Why were the securities based upon these mortgages not considered anywhere as risky as they actually turned out to be? This report concludes that, in an attempt to increase home ownership, particularly by minorities and the less affluent, virtually every branch of the government undertook an attack on underwriting standards starting in the early 1990s. Regulators, academic specialists, GSEs, and housing activists universally praised the decline in mortgage-under- writing standards as an “innovation” in mortgage lending. This weakening of underwriting standards succeeded in increasing home ownership and also the price of housing, helping to lead to a housing price bubble. The price bubble, along with relaxed lending standards, allowed speculators to purchase homes without putting their own money at risk. The recent rise in foreclosures is not related empirically to the distinction between subprime and prime loans since both sustained the same percent- age increase of foreclosures and at the same time. Nor is it consistent with the “nasty subprime lender” hypothesis currently considered to be the cause of the mortgage meltdown. Instead, the important factor is the distinction between adjustable-rate and fixed-rate mortgages. This evidence is consistent with speculators turning and running when housing prices stopped rising.
- Topic:
- Economics, Government, Markets, Financial Crisis, and Minorities
- Political Geography:
- United States
245. Current Account Sustainability and Relative Reliability
- Author:
- Stephanie E. Curcuru and Charles P. Thomas
- Publication Date:
- 09-2008
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
- Abstract:
- The sustainability of the large and persistent U.S. current account deficits is one of the biggest issues currently being confronted by international macroeconomists. Some very plausible theories suggest that the substantial global imbalances can continue in a benign manner, other equally plausible theories predict a disorderly resolution, and in general it is very difficult to discern between competing theories. To inform the debates, we view competing theories through the perspective of the relative reliability of the data the theories rely on. Our analysis of the dark matter theory is cursory; from a relative reliability perspective, it fails as it is built on the assumption that an item that is largely unmeasured is the most accurate component of the entire set of international accounts. Similarly, the best data currently available suggest that U.S. returns differentials are much smaller than implied by the exorbitant privilege theory. Our analysis opens up questions about potential inconsistencies in the international accounts, which we address by providing rough estimates of various holes in the accounts.
- Topic:
- International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Investment
- Political Geography:
- United States and North America
246. Credit Crisis: The Sky is not Falling
- Author:
- Anthony Downs
- Publication Date:
- 10-2007
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- U.S. stock markets are gyrating on news of an apparent credit crunch generated by defaults among subprime home mortgage loans. Such frenzy has spurred Wall Street to cry capital crisis. However, there is no shortage of capital – only a shortage of confidence in some of the instruments Wall Street has invented. Much financial capital is still out there looking for a home.
- Topic:
- Economics and Markets
- Political Geography:
- United States
247. Better Workers for Better Jobs: Improving Worker Advancement in the Low-Wage Labor Market
- Author:
- Harry J. Holzer
- Publication Date:
- 12-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- This paper proposes a new federal funding stream to identify, expand, and replicate the most successful state and local initiatives designed to spur the advancement of low-wage workers in the United States. In the Worker Advancement Grants for Employment in States (WAGES) program, the federal government would offer up to $5 billion annually in matching funds for increases in state, local, and private expenditures on worker advancement initiatives. To gain funding, states would have to develop local advancement “systems,” which would provide career-oriented education and training to youth, working poor adults and “hard-to-employ” workers. Partnerships would be developed between local training providers (like community colleges), employer associations, and intermediaries. Additional financial supports for the working poor—including child care, transportation, and stipends for working students—would have to be funded as well. Initially, the WAGES program would require states to compete for federal grants, which would ultimately be renewable. The program would generate a “learning system” in which states would have an incentive to innovate and use information from other initiatives. The federal government would provide substantial technical assistance and oversight. Performance measurement and rigorous evaluation would be required for program renewal; states achieving substantial worker advancement would be awarded major bonuses and more rapid renewal of funding.
- Topic:
- Economics, Markets, and Political Economy
- Political Geography:
- United States
248. Back to the Future: The Need for Patient Equity in Real Estate Development Finance
- Author:
- Christopher B. Leinberger
- Publication Date:
- 01-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Brookings Institution
- Abstract:
- Over the past decade, the real estate field has begun applying many of the development strategies employed by a number of iconic developers active before 1940. J.C. Nichols (Country Club Plaza in Kansas City), George Merrick (Coral Gables, Florida), the Rockefeller family (Rockefeller Center), and others have become role models, their major developments emulated in recently revived downtowns, suburban town centers, New Urbanism projects, and transit oriented developments. But while nearly all of the attention today has been on the urban design lessons of these developers and their projects, there are financing lessons they can teach us as well.
- Topic:
- Demographics, Development, Economics, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- United States and Florida
249. In Pursuit of Happiness Research: Is It Reliable? What Does It Imply for Policy?
- Author:
- Will Wilkinson
- Publication Date:
- 04-2007
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Cato Institute
- Abstract:
- “Happiness research” studies the correlates of subjective well-being, generally through survey methods. A number of psychologists and social scientists have drawn upon this work recently to argue that the American model of relatively limited government and a dynamic market economy corrodes happiness, whereas Western European and Scandinavian-style social democracies pro- mote it. This paper argues that happiness research in fact poses no threat to the relatively libertarian ideals embodied in the U.S. socioeconomic system. Happiness research is seriously hampered by confusion and disagreement about the definition of its subject as well as the limitations inherent in current measurement techniques. In its present state happiness research cannot be relied on as an authoritative source for empirical information about happiness, which, in any case, is not a simple empirical phenomenon but a cultural and historical moving target. Yet, even if we accept the data of happiness research at face value, few of the alleged redistributive policy implications actually follow from the evidence. The data show that neither higher rates of government redistribution nor lower levels of income inequality make us happier, whereas high levels of economic freedom and high average incomes are among the strongest correlates of subjective well- being. Even if we table the damning charges of questionable science and bad moral philosophy, the American model still comes off a glowing success in terms of happiness.
- Topic:
- Economics, Markets, and Political Economy
- Political Geography:
- United States, America, and Europe
250. Famine in North Korea: AsiaSource Interview with Marcus Noland
- Author:
- Nermeen Shaikh
- Publication Date:
- 04-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Asia Society
- Abstract:
- Marcus Noland is a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. His work encompasses a wide range of topics including the political economy of US trade policy and the Asian financial crisis. Mr Noland is unique among American economists in having devoted serious scholarly effort to the problems of North Korea and the prospects for Korean unification. He won the 2000–01 Ohira Masayoshi Award for his book Avoiding the Apocalypse: The Future of the Two Koreas.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- United States, America, Asia, North Korea, and Korea