Amid a growing anxiety over their liability in health coverage decisions, companies of all sizes are increasingly wanting to end their role as the middle-man between their employees and the insurance companies they contract with to provide health benefits.
Well, the proof is in: the new economy is a job-creating, profit-generating monster. According to a University of Texas study, the Internet industry added 650,000 jobs last year and increased its revenues by 62 percent. Companies or parts of companies that generate revenue from Internet activities accounted for two and a half million jobs and $524 billion in revenue last year.
Let's be clear what anti-smoking forces want: force people to stop smoking and put tobacco companies out of business. End of story.
When the Gallup Poll asked Americans to rate the presidents since 1960, guess who came out second — over LBJ and even Ronald Reagan? George Bush. And in a recent New Republic article, the Brookings Institution's Jonathon Rauch applauded the results, calling Bush our best modern president.
The nation's system of probation and parole should be replaced by a system similar to the use of private bail bondsmen for pretrial releases.
I'd like to recommend a book by columnist Bob Greene. Greene wanted to write about his dying World War II veteran father and the war that shaped him and many of his generation. In the process, he got to know another man who lived in his home town of Columbus, Ohio, a man who had consistently avoided publicity and in fact had dodged Greene's interview requests for years: Paul Tibbets, the man who dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.
For a number of years there was a general perception among voters that candidates for high office never addressed issues of importance to the average person. This perception made it easy for many Americans to turn off and to tune out.
A postscript to the Million Mom March, the well-meaning women whose hearts are in the right place even if the evidence against their cause is overwhelming.
In 1994, Texas citizens approved a nonbinding resolution asking the state to grant Texans the right to carry concealed weapons. Gov. Ann Richards had vetoed such a bill prior to the vote and vowed that no such bill would pass while she was governor. By contrast, her opponent in the race for governor, George W. Bush, said that if elected he would sign an appropriately structured "right-to-carry" law. Bush won the election and on May 26, 1995, signed a law granting Texans the right to carry concealed firearms. When he did so, Texas joined 22 other states that since 1986 have made it legal to carry concealed weapons.
The federal estate tax has been instituted and repealed several times. Usually it has been seen as a source of revenue, rather than a means of redistributing wealth. But the current tax is clearly designed to redistribute wealth: it is imposed on estates with a value of as little as $675,000 and rises rapidly to an effective tax rate of 60 percent – the second highest estate tax rate of any country in the world.
In South Africa, MSA plans have competed against other forms of insurance on a level playing field. The result has been remarkable. In a few short years, MSA plans have become increasingly popular, and they already have captured about half the market. By contrast, HMO-type managed care has made only small inroads.
Unless you've lived under a rock for the past six months, you're probably aware that gun control has become a major issue in the 2000 presidential campaign. Vice President Al Gore, a strong gun control advocate, has accused his presidential opponent, Texas Gov. George W. Bush, of being wrong and out of step by supporting and signing into law a law granting Texans the right to carry concealed firearms.
The probation and parole systems could be made more effective and efficient by enlisting the private sector. Those released on probation (nonincarceration) or released early from prison could be required to post a financial bond guaranteeing behavior in accord with terms of the release. If individual accountability is the answer to crime, then it must include the most powerful kind of accountability: financial responsibility.
Over the past century, government spending grew to an average of 45 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) among developed countries. Today, total government spending in the United States and other developed countries far exceeds the level at which it increases national income. This study examines the effects of government spending on certain noneconomic measures of social progress.