I had a very bad lunch today. But not because of what I ate. My lunch was unpleasant because I moderated anoontime panel on Capitol Hill featuring Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and my Cato colleague Chris Edwards. And I should hasten to add that they were splendid company. The unpleasant part of the lunch was […]

The Census Bureau just released a report on America’s aging population. The big takeaway is that our population will be getting much older between now and 2050. And since I’m a baby boomer, I very much like the fact that we’re expected to live longer. But as a public finance economist, I’m not nearly as happy. As […]

Self awareness is supposed to be a good thing, so I’m going to openly acknowledge that I have an unusual fixation on the size of government. I don’t lose a wink of sleep thinking about deficits, but I toss and turn all night fretting about the overall burden of government spending. My peculiar focus on the […]

One of the challenges of good entitlement reform (or even bad entitlement reform) is that recipients think they’ve “earned” benefits. If you tell them that programs such as Medicare are unsustainable and need to be changed, some of them suspect you’re trying to somehow cheat them. After all, they were forced to cough up payroll […]

What’s the most absurd “health” expenditure by government? There are lots of potential responses, including $240 million for penis pumps. Or how about the fact that Obamacare allows taxpayer-subsidized viagra for sex offenders? But another potential answer is cosmetic surgery for “droopy eyelids.” Here are some of the details from a Miami Herald report. Aging […]

This is a tough question. I obviously want comprehensive reform of all entitlement programs, so selecting just one is a bit of a challenge. Sort of like being asked to pick your favorite kid. Would I reform Social Security? That’s a logical choice. It’s the biggest program in the federal budget, so it’s presumably the […]

I’m never guilty of being an optimist, but two items caught my attention today that suggest the tide may be turning on entitlement reform. We’ll start with something from the New York Times. Regular readers know that I’ve criticized that paper on a few occasions. Sometimes it’s because of silly editorializing, such as this bit […]

The Chairman of the House Budget Committee has produced a new budget plan which contrasts very favorably with the tax-heavy, big-spending proposal submitted by the President last month. Perhaps most important, Congressman Ryan’s plan restrains spending growth, allowing the private sector to grow faster than the burden of government, thus satisfying Mitchell’s Golden Rule so […]

It’s obviously quite disappointing that Congressman Paul Ryan has teamed up with Senator Ron Wyden, a Democratic from Oregon, to put forth a significantly watered down version of his Medicare reform plan. Ben Domenech of the Heartland Institute and Peter Suderman of Reason have good summaries of why the new plan is a less-than-exciting development. […]

I have a new article for National Review about the fallout from the Supercommittee. Among the points I make are: o We were lucky to dodge a tax hike. o There’s still a threat of a tax hike if big-government Republicans side with the so-called rational left in favor of a tax-increase proposal, such as […]