Readers may have noticed that the "Daily Treatment" isn't really daily. Instead, it's daily when I have time to write it, which isn't as often as I would like. And that's unfortunate.
It means I don't get to chance to highlight many worthy articles--or, more important, to thank, implicitly, the writers and thinkers whose work influences me. So today I'm bringing the Daily Treatment back, but offering an extended holiday version--one in which I can give thanks to...
Julie Appleby, Mary Agnes Carey, Philip Galewitz, and Jordan Rau for asking, and answering, the questions most Americans actually care about
Carrie Budoff Brown for her relentless, indispensable coverage
Brian Beutler for being impervious to spin (and nearly impervious to bullets)
Michael Cannon for keeping me honest
Kevin Drum for staying healthy
A group of economists has issued a letter endorsing both the principles of cost control in the Senate Finance bill and the idea of health care reform more generally. But this is not just any old group of economists. This is an unusually impressive group, including a pair of Nobel laureates and some figures who don't typically weigh in on current policy debates: Kenneth Arrow, Victor Fuchs, Daniel McFadden, Joseph Newhouse. The signatories also cover a pretty broad swath of ideological territory, from the likes of Peter Diamond and Uwe Reinhardt on the left to Katherine Baicker and Mark McClellan on the right. (Baicker and McClellan served in in the Bush administration.)
One apparent purpose of the letter is to focus attention on a pair of controversial proposals within the Senate Finance bill: Imposing a tax on expensive health benefits and strengthening a commission that advises Medicare payment policies. Neither idea is in the House bill; both run afoul of powerful political constituencies. They won't make it all the way through the legislative process without political reinforcement, the kind this letter may provide
But the letter also has a broader significance.
