Wednesday Links

Posted on by John C. Goodman

The debt deal may actually weaken work requirements.  That’s because the bill’s new exemptions (for homeless people, veterans, and young adults who grew up in foster care) remove more people from existing work mandates than the number of people the bill adds.

In 2021, 42 million adults in the United States sought mental-health care of one form or another. But does therapy really work? The evidence is mixed. (NYT)

The Biden administration funds a grant to a project that discovers the GOP, Fox News, the Heritage Foundations, etc. are the foundation of Nazi, white supremacist and other hate groups.

“We find that a 1-year reduction in effective patent length reduces the number of new drugs brought to market from 46 to 39 per year (a 16% decline), decreasing in social welfare by $9.0 trillion between 2021 and 2050. Consumers incur 75.8% ($6.8 trillion) of the reduction in social welfare.”

1 thought on “Wednesday Links”

  1. I am somewhat reserved about the claim by Jason Shafrin that a reduction in patent length will harm social welfare.

    First of all, drug companies already use a variety of devious techniques to extend their monopoly pricing. Just look up pay-for-delay, product-hopping, et al. It is not quite the benign world of social good that Shafrin assumes.

    Secondly, I am not sure that all drug spending automatically creates social welfare. The drug Sovaldi can cure Hepatitis C, which means that drug addicts live longer. I am not sure that is pure social welfare.

    Reply

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