Comments for E.J. Dionne Understands Zero Economics at http://www.cepr.net , comment 1 to 9 out of 9 comments http://www.cepr.net Wed, 19 Jun 2013 14:35:11 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.3 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12428 Good post, but one quibble. Why talk about "conservatives" when you really mean "right-wingers"? If a conservative is somebody who is reluctant and suspicious about change and who is particularly inclined to oppose fast, large-scale change, then the "conservatives" you refer to in the post are really howling radicals. Massive deregulation, privatisation, destruction of unions and redistribution upwards, all at a breakneck pace, are characteristic of the people you call "conservative", but those policy goals are really almost the opposite of real conservatism. - gordon Thu, 27 Oct 2011 14:49:17 +0100 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12423 I concur with the poor framing of the liberal vs conservative viewpoints of the market and government regulation, but I don't see how this applies to Dionne's op-ed. From what I get from the article, "conservative Catholics" are trying to distance this report from one of the Pontifical offices from "True Catholicism", and this report finds that increased governmental oversight combined with all actors acting ethically with a bent toward some global good should be the goal. I don't see where Dionne explicitly calls these "conservative Catholics" free market advocates, and I don't see where he implies it either. - Shawn Wilkinson Thu, 27 Oct 2011 08:22:53 +0100 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12422 He is one of my favorite TV talking heads because he is left-of-the-center as you say. You are right about "loser liberalism" but why pick on poor E. J.? He is following the mainstream democratic narrative script I guess. You are right that democrats need to embrace "liberal" and make it cool again like Paul Krugman does but that is generalized problem with Left in this country not any particular columnist. - hitesh brahmbhatt Thu, 27 Oct 2011 06:35:12 +0100 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12420 I see your point, but I think it's somewhat unfair to Dionne. Conservative leaders in congress do pretty consistently advocate less regulation, so you are wrong when it comes to what they say. They are so intellectually dishonest that they advocate a position they don't believe. That a fair enough point, but it seems to me also reasonable to rebut the argument they are making. So it's necessary to rebut both the argument, and the reality. It's not one or the other. We need both points, it seems to me, plus calling them on the lie. - William Berkson Thu, 27 Oct 2011 06:16:56 +0100 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12419 "The real issue is whether the government is going structure markets in ways that have the effect of pushing income upwards, which has been the situation for most of the last three decades or whether it will design policies that benefit the vast majority of the population. This is the 1 percent versus the 99 percent question." - pete Thu, 27 Oct 2011 05:44:59 +0100 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12417 What does this post refer to? Dionne's latest column is about the Pope. - skeptonomist Thu, 27 Oct 2011 04:36:56 +0100 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12415 actually, the hard core left are closer to anarchism than 'government regulation'- to the true liberal, concentration of power is the root of all evil, because of corruption- local communal governance, or communes, would be functional political entities which would interplay to form the larger political landscape- yeah, it's utopian, but then again so is a 'free market' - frankenduf Thu, 27 Oct 2011 04:18:12 +0100 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12414 [quote]It is far more politically palatable to be seen supporting a free market than to be supporting policies that are intended to aid a small elite at the expense of the bulk of the population.[/quote] Any economist knows it's not possible to fool most of the people most of the time since the wisdom of crowds ultimately prevails. Anyone pretending to support free markets at the expense of undermining and exploiting them such as David Brooks would be outed eventually as a fraud. Anyone pretending to support regulation at the expense of free markets such as E.J. Dione likewise would be condemned as a charlatan supporter of Brooks in disguise. Brooks and Dione are a microcosm of the great debate between free markets and socialism - not between no free markets of one kind versus no free markets of another kind. Americans are not as dumb as Whose Your Nanny Baker claims. They know when their bread is buttered on both sides of opposing competing positions, it drives the best postions into optimally baked bread that satiates all hunger for economic knowledge. Stupid liberals. - izzatzo Thu, 27 Oct 2011 04:15:01 +0100 http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/ej-dionne-understands-zero-economics#comment-12412 Yes and no.Together with subsidizing income tax deficits with payroll tax surpluses, healthcare has been the primary mechanism for redistributing income and wealth upwards. But for increasing health care costs, over the last three decades median US real wage increases would have more than doubled. US healthcare costs are twice, or more, than those of virtually every other industrialized country; and consistently, the incomes of physicians in the US are over twice theirs. Because our competitors’ healthcare costs are so much lower than ours, our manufacturers and workers suffer huge competitive disadvantages. Hence, the single most important way that we can reverse the upward redistribution of income is to adopt a fully socialized healthcare system (similar to those of our competitors, and the Veterans Administration). This is also the primary reason that Republicons so strenuously resist attempts to reform healthcare - bmz Thu, 27 Oct 2011 03:35:03 +0100