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Robert Frank: Commonsense Principles for Troubled Times

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Robert Frank: Healthcare System a 'Failed Business Model'

02 min 48 sec

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Economist Robert Frank calls the current healthcare system a "failed business model" because people must rely on private insurers whose incentives are to exclude individuals who need care from acquiring coverage.
Robert Frank: Stimulus Necessary, 'Deficits Be Damned'

06 min 17 sec

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Economist Robert Frank agrees with Keynes who said that in an economic crisis, the government is the only actor with the capability to "prime the pump" of economic growth.
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01 hr 07 min 32 sec

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balthazarF

Posted: 03.19.10, 01:08 PM

Billed as Robert Frank: Healthcare System a 'Failed Business Model Yes, it is obvious that the for-profit insurance of health care is a failed system. Count one, the denial of medical procedures, hence the denial of health care because any thing for-profit is fiduciarily obligated to the stockholders/owners and not the insured. Count two, the 'Business Model" of capitalism is anti-democratic and corporations, a tool of capitalists, is undemocratic. Count three, the "Business Model" is in 'systemic failure'. Count four, capitalism has no national allegiances and capital is fungible. Count five, unemployment and a legislated wage permissive of poverty amount to subsidies to capitalists, prohibit people from buying for-profit health insurance. Count six, to the extent that people are denied capital for their labor by the capitalists, an established fact, which means those people, unable to afford modern life's basic necessities, become a burden on a failed system. Now in the capitalist caused depression states are taxing the poor more heavily while refusing to eliminate tax loop-holes which benefit only capitalists. That's enough to start with.

phiscal

Posted: 07.24.09, 06:15 PM

I like the consumption tax. The basic premise of his presentation, though, that rising standards of living make people unhappy is tough to support. He appears to be a big gov, big spender, limited liberty kind of guy.

MikeCotugno

Posted: 07.10.09, 06:14 PM

Damn Keynesian's. I don't understand the theory behind applying the theory of evolution to the free market. Clever fallacies if I've ever seen them.

bryphi

Posted: 07.07.09, 10:00 PM

I don't care what most academics think! They got us here in the first place. If you think things are getting better you are clueless to what is going on around you. The markets and unemployment are not stabilizing! Open up your eyes my friend... We haven't even come close to the bottom yet.

RoyalWe

Posted: 07.07.09, 09:56 PM

Also Steve - if you really think that "this theory is being proven effective" you are in for a world of disappointment as a crushing pincer of inflation and debt derail the American economy in the next 1-2 years. I know a few economists with pretty serious pedigrees, mostly Obama supporters - and all of them privately express that this thing is not ending soon or well.

RoyalWe

Posted: 07.07.09, 09:49 PM

Steves...... you say "I wonder if you guys also believe FDR was responsible for much of the great depression instead of the savior of it?" as if that's some far-fetched theory. Sorry buddy, it's not. Scholars and economists disagree - but there are plenty of numbers to support the case that FDR, while a great leader, failed on an epic level in his efforts to stimulate the American economy. For starters, as you probably learned even at your FDR-built university, the Depression lasted for 11 years. The argument can be compellingly made that it didn't have to. Point being: if you think that there isn't a very strong case to be made that FDR was nothing like a savior and in fact was a leading perpetrator in an unnecessarily long downturn, then you haven't read enough.

dutchguilder

Posted: 07.07.09, 09:32 PM

This guy is an idiot who has staked his career on the fairy tale of "Keynesianism".

stevesrebelclone

Posted: 07.07.09, 09:13 PM

Haha Deficits be damned! I think most academics agree that the best use of stimulus money would be the improvement, modernization, and creation of infrastructure, which is what (if you were even listening) was advocating. The college I go to right now, for example, was built in 1933 by one of FDR's alphabet soup agencies. The markets, and unemployment numbers are stabilizing and the hiring rate has been improving 3 months in a row, this theory is being proven effective. I wonder if you guys also believe FDR was responsible for much of the great depression instead of the savior of it?

bryphi

Posted: 07.07.09, 09:04 PM

This guy is a propaganda tool... Print a ton of money and inflate the currency so the average persons standard of living goes down. While the very wealthy are the ones that end up with the money. These bailouts do nothing for the middle class except make there daily life more expensive.

mw1229

Posted: 07.07.09, 06:50 PM

Some issues that this concept raises are the fact that many, like myself, don't trust the government to spend my/their money intelligently. This professor's idea of an individual receiving government money that he/she will then in turn spend into the economy is an atom bomb of naivety. While that could potentially work, what the government of USA would do is give it to big business to redecorate their offices with ridiculously over-priced items or pay lawyers to try and get more. What percentage of the dollar would go to the individual or the economy?

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