- Paragon study: In 2023, the federal government is expected to spend 6.2 percent of the economy (or more than $1.6 trillion) on mandatory health programs. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that within 30 years, the federal government will annually spend at least 9 percent of the economy on those programs. And this is a conservative estimate.
- A little-noticed provision of the omnibus spending bill could give the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) the power to ban off-label use of approved therapies, even though 1 in 5 prescriptions written are for an off-label use.
- Study: Laughter really is contagious – and that’s good. (WaPo)
- Diversity training not only doesn’t work, it may actually backfire. So why are we spending $3.4B a year on it? (NYT)
- Fourth Quarter lobbying: almost $7 million by the American Hospital Association and $6.6 million by PhRMA. As Milton Friedman said, the question is not why we get so many bad laws; the question is, why aren’t things worse?
- Amazon will sell generic drugs for as little as $5 a month. But, no Medicare or Medicaid or private insurance.
- 25 of the 37 novel drugs approved in 2022, were first approved in the US.
Category: Tuesday Links
Tuesday Links
- America’s public hospitals are privatizing.
- The Economist: Now is a bad time to have a heart attack. Hospitals around the world are having trouble meeting the demand.
- Wokeness comes to medical schools: Instead of thinking, “How can my patients protect themselves against health problems?” the AAMC asks medical students to think, “What kind of public collective action is necessary to confront health inequity across identifiable populations?”
- US cancer death rate is down by a third.
- Having a friend is healthier than having a life partner; it’s even as important as diet and sleep. (WaPo)
- Lottery winner gets $1.35B prize. The bulk of the prize money comes from below-average-income ticker buyers, of course, even though this lottery was created by liberal lawmakers in a liberal state. All of the critics who routinely remind us of the evils of inequality are saying …. hum … not much of anything.
Tuesday Links
- How the Romans chose new leaders: Of the 69 rulers of the unified Roman Empire, from Augustus (d. 14 CE) to Theodosius (d. 395 CE), 62% suffered violent death.
- Scott Sumner: Nationalism is hazardous to your health.
- Paul Ehrlich promoted more fake predictions on “60 Minutes.”
- WaPo: Social Security’s is using of archaic job-availability lists to deny benefits to obviously disabled people.
- WaPo: Social Security is imposing of astronomical penalties on people, many poor and disables, for spending checks mistakenly sent them by Social Security.
- The far more egregious financial malfeasance that WaPo missed: the huge fraud Social Security has committed against 13,000 plus widow(er)s who collectively have been swindled out of $130 million.
Tuesday Links
- Tyler Cowen: 2022 was a great year for affirming the wisdom of classical economic theory.
- Debunking the benefits of exercise. (speculative)
- Researchers discovered more than half a million conspiratorial and misleading English languages tweets about covid. NYT still hasn’t discovered Elon Musk’s released tweets showing how Twitter censored good information and promoted bad. I guess you have to watch Fox News to know about that.
- The fact that we failed to notice 99.999% of life on Earth until a few years ago is unsettling and has implications for Mars. HT: Tyler
- Why did the IRA bill allow the free-food-for-kids program to expire, while extending tax subsidies for health insurance for the rich. (NYT) Answer: kids don’t vote.