Category Archives: Economy
It’s Complicated
HHS Secretary Sebelius admitted that ObamaCare is complicated. Senator Jay Rockefeller calls it “the most complex piece of legislation ever passed by the United States Congress”. And he helped design it.
Meanwhile the ACLU says IRS is reading your email.
Iron Lady
Maggie Thatcher died Monday morning. She was preceded in death by Ronald Reagan and John Paul II, the trinity that won the cold war.
Unemployment
The economy added 88,000 jobs in March and the unemployment rate dropped to 7.6%. The bad news is 500,000 people left the labor market. Only 63.3% of potential workers actually have a job. That’s the lowest labor market participation since 1979 according to IBD. If you include those who have given up looking for a job the unemployment rate is 11.1%.
In 1968 there were 51 full-time workers for every 1 on disability. In January 2013 that ratio is 13-1.
Sequester Scare
The White House is gamely sticking with its policy of Sequester Scare. The president has given himself a 5% pay cut as a show of solidarity with the tots without tours who are denied spring break access to the White House.
In February Janet Napolitano said the Border Patrol would be cut by 5,000 agents. This week it was announced those cuts would be delayed. Here’s Fox News’ Ed Henry asking Jay Carney if Napolitano had been deliberately misleading.
Obamascare
Health insurance rates are taking off under Obamacare, especially if you now carry a high deductible plan. Kathleen Sebelius agrees.
“Some of these folks have very high catastrophic plans that don’t pay for anything unless you get hit by a bus,” she said. “They’re really mortgage protection, not health insurance.”
Megan McCardle at the Daily Beast thinks Sebelius is confused about what insurance is.
Sebelius’ response is apparently that catastrophic insurance isn’t really insurance at all–which is exactly backwards. Catastrophic coverage is “true insurance”. Coverage of routine, predictable services is not insurance at all; it’s a spectacularly inefficient prepayment plan.
“This is not insurance anymore. This is regulation, this is government dictated rates, like the electrical company…”
