The health care bill passed by the Democrats includes a lot of provisions that depend on firm size, and which do not apply to firms smaller than some (arbitrary) limit. Most people like small firms and entrepreneurship. However both the left and the right often misunderstand sensible small business policy:
1. First of all, just because something is good, it does not mean the government should subsidize it. There are benefits (closer management control, fewer transactions costs, more flexibility) to small businesses, but there are also costs (less economies of scale, lower productivity). In a functioning economy some firms will be small and some firms large, depending on their relative advantages.
You need strong arguments, some form of important externality for example, for the government to tip the balance in favor of small firms.
Small firms are more expensive to insure, because of administrative costs, economies of scale and because large firms have the advantage of offering a large and diverse workforce that the insurance companies can pool.
Sure, this is “unfair” for small companies, but it also reflects real costs of the economy. In terms of efficiencies there should be fewer small firms because small firms have higher costs. It is “unfair” for Saab that Toyota has economies of scale and can offer the same quality cars cheaper. But that reflects real costs of the economy, there should be few large car companies because of the economies of scale in the car industry.
2. More important here: The main advantage of entrepreneurship is not that these firms are small, it is that they are growing. There is empirical evidence for this. Fast growing firms (“gazelles”) introduce new innovations into the economy, create new and better jobs and increase competition. We want small firms to grow if possible, not to stay small.
Here are some examples:
* The bill offer tax credits to small businesses who have fewer than 25 employees.
*The bill imposes a $2000 per employee tax penalty on employers with over 50 employees who do not offer health insurance to their full-time workers.
* The bill states that in firms with more than 50 employees nursing mothers must be allowed breaks, a year after giving birth, on the job to express breast milk as often as necessary; they must do so in a private place that’s not a bathroom.
* The bill states that chain-restaurants and food vendors with 20 or more locations are required to display the caloric content of their foods on menus, drive-through menus, and vending machines.
As bad as regulations are, they may have even worse effects if some firms are exempted, because in order to receive the exemptions firms behavior is distorted even more.
What the Democrat bill does is create an incentive for small firms to stay exactly below the limit (25 employees, 50 employees, 20 locations etc). This is similar to the unproductive Italian system, with lots and lots of small firms who escape regulations, but few Googles and Wall-Marts.
Italy, Greece, Turkey and Mexico have a much higher share of self-employed and more small firms than the U.S. But these is a reflection of low productivity, regulatory burdens, high taxes and large transaction costs, not entrepreneurship. The U.S has much more innovative entrepreneurship than these countries.
Helping small businesses stay small is not entrepreneurship policy, it is the exact opposite.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Some facts and figures on time use
I am a little busy, so I will do some lazy blogging. I will translate some facts in my Swedish report about time use every day. There is lots of interesting data in here, so it could generate a few decent blog posts.
First, here is the gender distribution of time.
Sweden and the United States are similar in the gender distribution of time worked in the market, men do about 60% of market work. In Europe (which includes most of eastern Europe but not Russia), men do 65% of market work.
For home production Sweden is the most equal, women do 60% of home production, the U.S the second most equal as women do 64% of home production. Europe is less equal, women do 68% of home production. Stereotypes are confirmed as the disparity is especially true for Southern Europe.
Cohabiting men and women have a more unequal distribution of hours worked than the rest of the population.
What is interesting for all groups is that the distribution evens out. Work and home production are similarly sizes. For the U.S and Sweden women and men in total (adding home production to market work) work the same amounts of hours. In Europe women work slightly more in total than men, but even here the differences are not large.
Feminists who claim that women work more and have less free time than men are wrong.
(Europe refers to the weighted average of 6 big Europeans nations Germany, France, UK, Italy, Spain and Poland and the 10 smaller nations Norway, Hungary, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, Finland, Slovenia, Bulgaria and Belgium.)
First, here is the gender distribution of time.
Sweden and the United States are similar in the gender distribution of time worked in the market, men do about 60% of market work. In Europe (which includes most of eastern Europe but not Russia), men do 65% of market work.
For home production Sweden is the most equal, women do 60% of home production, the U.S the second most equal as women do 64% of home production. Europe is less equal, women do 68% of home production. Stereotypes are confirmed as the disparity is especially true for Southern Europe.
Cohabiting men and women have a more unequal distribution of hours worked than the rest of the population.
What is interesting for all groups is that the distribution evens out. Work and home production are similarly sizes. For the U.S and Sweden women and men in total (adding home production to market work) work the same amounts of hours. In Europe women work slightly more in total than men, but even here the differences are not large.
Feminists who claim that women work more and have less free time than men are wrong.
(Europe refers to the weighted average of 6 big Europeans nations Germany, France, UK, Italy, Spain and Poland and the 10 smaller nations Norway, Hungary, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Sweden, Finland, Slovenia, Bulgaria and Belgium.)
Saturday, March 27, 2010
David Frum and Bruce Bartlett are full of it
I have followed David Frum for years. I read probably every post he wrote on New Majority/FrumForum. I have defended him in arguments with friends. Boy do I feel like a fool.
From my reading Frum was genuinely a free marketer, who made the legitimate point that the GOP needs to be more intellectual and advocate more moderate policies on some issues.
Bruce Bartlett in contrast is just another Social Democrat, someone who claims taxes do not affect economic behavior in a major ways, someone who wants people to accept the delusion that the payroll tax is not a tax on the worker’s income, someone who wants the U.S to be impressed by and emulate the French economy, even though the U.S produces 50% more on a per capita basis than France.
I twice took the time to point out errors in Fromforum, once when they claimed there were 1 million Iranians in the U.S (they corrected this), and once when they claimed typical Americans earning 50.000 a year only pay 7.5% in federal taxes, because they are in the 7.5% bracket (they did not correct this).
But the last few days has convinced me I was wrong to trust David Frum.
Regarding the dispute between AEI and David Frum on why he was let go, I am of course no mind reader. However Frum and Bartlett, especially Bartlett, have made claims that were demonstrably false and that they have subsequently had to retract.
Attacks on conservatives by other conservative attract a lot of media. However if the only thing you do is attack other conservatives, and if there is the suspicion that you only refer to yourself as a conservative to be more effective in undermining the right, people get understandably upset. Yet, if the attacks are based on legitimate concerns, conservatives should take them to heart. More importantly, the substance of the criticism tells us something about Frum and Bartlett’s motivations.
So the core issue is whether there is some merit to Frum and Bartlett´s original attacks regarding Obamacare. While I don’t want to waste reader’s time with personal feuds, I can tell you what free-market theory on American health care policy is. Reasonable people can disagree about whether or not the free market side arguments I believe in are correct, but it is nevertheless useful to articulate what my side of the argument believes.
Frum and Bartlett central claim is that free market people at AEI in particular and Republicans in general intellectually like Obamas health care plan (or, they should like if they just were less partisan). From the “intellectual” free market perspective that Bartlett and Frum have, Obama’s plan is decent. Republicans should have worked with Obama to make it even better.
AEI scholars deep inside know the plan is good and that the current system is in need of reform, they are just pressured not to say this. Frum and Bartlett claim that to the extent that the right does not support Obama, it is because they are not intellectuals. They further claim that the intellectual cadre of right wing thinker secretly approve of Obama’s plan, but are just afraid of saying so.
Are these claims plausible? No. They are moronic. Here is the free market view:
We believe there is a massive problem in American Health care, caused by the collective action problem of third party finance. The third party system is arguably caused by government policy.
In 1945 the way Americans paid for health care was the same way they paid for other services, out of their own pockets. Around 70-80% of health finance was out of pocket. Due to wage caps and due to the tax system this system was replaced by insurance tied to the employer (another reason insurance is tied to the employer is adverse selection, but free marketers emphasize the tax reasons). Even in 1960 out of pocket was still 60% of health care finance. At this point the government further entrenched the third party payer system by introducing Medicare and Medicaid, which grew rapidly. These trends completely transformed how health care was produced:
Since almost all of the clients are third party payers. Health producers no longer have functioning systems of buying health care directly. Currently, out of pocket is 13% of health care finance. 87% of the system is third payer.
The health care inflation caused by collective action problems has contributed to increasing the number of uninsured. More problematically, being uninsured is now much worse than being uninsured in 1945, because you no longer can buy reasonably prices health services.
The health care bill passed by Congress only exacerbates the central problem of the American system. If the problem is too much health spending and third party payers, the plan *increases* the government subsidy to employer provided health care. It expands Medicaid, a entitlement plan already trillion dollars in the red long term. It worsens the even larger deficits of Medicaid, by taking out the low hanging fruit in terms of tightening the program and using them to finance more subsidies.
The plan also creates massive implicit tax rate increases. These tax rates are worse even than ordinary taxes for the supply of taxable income. The reason is that the tax increases not only have a negative substitution effect on supply, they are combined with a subsidy, so they also have a income effect that reduces supply.
Bruce Bartlett has repudiated mainstream economics and thinks that taxes do not adversely affect the economy. But remember, we are not discussing what a Social Democrat thinks about Obama’s reform. The claim is about intellectual conservatives. Frum and Bartlett claim that Republicans should like this plan, and that AEI scholars secretly already do. A plan that massively raises implicit taxes on large parts of the middle class, that introduces regulations that incentivize corporations to stay small, that increases the subsidy for third party financed health care.
Milton Freidman was the main pro market intellectual of the century. Do you think, that if Milton Friedman was alive today, he, as an intellectual, would have supported the general thrust of Obamacare? This is essentially what Frum and Bartlett claim. Are we supposed to take these people seriously?
Read how Milton Friedman diagnosis the American Health Care in 2001 and judge yourself what the top free market intellectual would have thought of Obama-care. I guess if Milton Friedman were alive today and criticized Obama, Bruce Bartlett would say that he was not really an intellectual, and David Frum would claim that Friedman was secretly in favor of Obama-care and afraid of “donors” to reveal his true feelings.
The second claim of David Frum is that Republicans should have worked with Obama to make the plan better, and passed it in a bipartisan fashion. Let us say, for the sake of the argument, that this would have made the plan somewhat less catastrophic for the country. Of course with the political balance of power being what it is, the core of the plan would have passed.
But at what long term cost for free-market policies?!? Obama-care is likely to worsen health inflation in the U.S. It worsens the financing problem of Medicare. It probably increases the deficit. It is complex and massive intrusion in the economy, and will probably lead to unintended consequences (but I guess “intellectuals” Bartlett and Frum have not taken this into account).
When those problems inevitably emerge, what position will Republicans have if they helped Obama pass it?!?
With Frum’s political masterplan Democrats will get the political benefits of expanding entitlements to the lower middle class, and Republicans will not even have the benefit of principled free-marketers and the tax-paying groups that oppose the reform. What would libertarians think, many of whom already believe that Republicans are as bad fiscally as Democrats?
Are Republicans suppose to think David Frum has their best interest at heat, given how ludicrous his criticisms is, and how politically disastrous his advice would be? Are free-marketers supposed to think Bruce Bartlett is still a serious intellectual, given his shallow and almost dogmatically Social Democratic views?
And are observers of the AEI-Frum controversy who know the basics of free-market liberalism suppose to believe that intellectual at the AEI secretly admired Obama´s ruinous plan? David Frum would not have wasted my time and that of others had he just beeen more honest about who he has turned into.
From my reading Frum was genuinely a free marketer, who made the legitimate point that the GOP needs to be more intellectual and advocate more moderate policies on some issues.
Bruce Bartlett in contrast is just another Social Democrat, someone who claims taxes do not affect economic behavior in a major ways, someone who wants people to accept the delusion that the payroll tax is not a tax on the worker’s income, someone who wants the U.S to be impressed by and emulate the French economy, even though the U.S produces 50% more on a per capita basis than France.
I twice took the time to point out errors in Fromforum, once when they claimed there were 1 million Iranians in the U.S (they corrected this), and once when they claimed typical Americans earning 50.000 a year only pay 7.5% in federal taxes, because they are in the 7.5% bracket (they did not correct this).
But the last few days has convinced me I was wrong to trust David Frum.
Regarding the dispute between AEI and David Frum on why he was let go, I am of course no mind reader. However Frum and Bartlett, especially Bartlett, have made claims that were demonstrably false and that they have subsequently had to retract.
Attacks on conservatives by other conservative attract a lot of media. However if the only thing you do is attack other conservatives, and if there is the suspicion that you only refer to yourself as a conservative to be more effective in undermining the right, people get understandably upset. Yet, if the attacks are based on legitimate concerns, conservatives should take them to heart. More importantly, the substance of the criticism tells us something about Frum and Bartlett’s motivations.
So the core issue is whether there is some merit to Frum and Bartlett´s original attacks regarding Obamacare. While I don’t want to waste reader’s time with personal feuds, I can tell you what free-market theory on American health care policy is. Reasonable people can disagree about whether or not the free market side arguments I believe in are correct, but it is nevertheless useful to articulate what my side of the argument believes.
Frum and Bartlett central claim is that free market people at AEI in particular and Republicans in general intellectually like Obamas health care plan (or, they should like if they just were less partisan). From the “intellectual” free market perspective that Bartlett and Frum have, Obama’s plan is decent. Republicans should have worked with Obama to make it even better.
AEI scholars deep inside know the plan is good and that the current system is in need of reform, they are just pressured not to say this. Frum and Bartlett claim that to the extent that the right does not support Obama, it is because they are not intellectuals. They further claim that the intellectual cadre of right wing thinker secretly approve of Obama’s plan, but are just afraid of saying so.
Are these claims plausible? No. They are moronic. Here is the free market view:
We believe there is a massive problem in American Health care, caused by the collective action problem of third party finance. The third party system is arguably caused by government policy.
In 1945 the way Americans paid for health care was the same way they paid for other services, out of their own pockets. Around 70-80% of health finance was out of pocket. Due to wage caps and due to the tax system this system was replaced by insurance tied to the employer (another reason insurance is tied to the employer is adverse selection, but free marketers emphasize the tax reasons). Even in 1960 out of pocket was still 60% of health care finance. At this point the government further entrenched the third party payer system by introducing Medicare and Medicaid, which grew rapidly. These trends completely transformed how health care was produced:
Since almost all of the clients are third party payers. Health producers no longer have functioning systems of buying health care directly. Currently, out of pocket is 13% of health care finance. 87% of the system is third payer.
The health care inflation caused by collective action problems has contributed to increasing the number of uninsured. More problematically, being uninsured is now much worse than being uninsured in 1945, because you no longer can buy reasonably prices health services.
The health care bill passed by Congress only exacerbates the central problem of the American system. If the problem is too much health spending and third party payers, the plan *increases* the government subsidy to employer provided health care. It expands Medicaid, a entitlement plan already trillion dollars in the red long term. It worsens the even larger deficits of Medicaid, by taking out the low hanging fruit in terms of tightening the program and using them to finance more subsidies.
The plan also creates massive implicit tax rate increases. These tax rates are worse even than ordinary taxes for the supply of taxable income. The reason is that the tax increases not only have a negative substitution effect on supply, they are combined with a subsidy, so they also have a income effect that reduces supply.
Bruce Bartlett has repudiated mainstream economics and thinks that taxes do not adversely affect the economy. But remember, we are not discussing what a Social Democrat thinks about Obama’s reform. The claim is about intellectual conservatives. Frum and Bartlett claim that Republicans should like this plan, and that AEI scholars secretly already do. A plan that massively raises implicit taxes on large parts of the middle class, that introduces regulations that incentivize corporations to stay small, that increases the subsidy for third party financed health care.
Milton Freidman was the main pro market intellectual of the century. Do you think, that if Milton Friedman was alive today, he, as an intellectual, would have supported the general thrust of Obamacare? This is essentially what Frum and Bartlett claim. Are we supposed to take these people seriously?
Read how Milton Friedman diagnosis the American Health Care in 2001 and judge yourself what the top free market intellectual would have thought of Obama-care. I guess if Milton Friedman were alive today and criticized Obama, Bruce Bartlett would say that he was not really an intellectual, and David Frum would claim that Friedman was secretly in favor of Obama-care and afraid of “donors” to reveal his true feelings.
The second claim of David Frum is that Republicans should have worked with Obama to make the plan better, and passed it in a bipartisan fashion. Let us say, for the sake of the argument, that this would have made the plan somewhat less catastrophic for the country. Of course with the political balance of power being what it is, the core of the plan would have passed.
But at what long term cost for free-market policies?!? Obama-care is likely to worsen health inflation in the U.S. It worsens the financing problem of Medicare. It probably increases the deficit. It is complex and massive intrusion in the economy, and will probably lead to unintended consequences (but I guess “intellectuals” Bartlett and Frum have not taken this into account).
When those problems inevitably emerge, what position will Republicans have if they helped Obama pass it?!?
With Frum’s political masterplan Democrats will get the political benefits of expanding entitlements to the lower middle class, and Republicans will not even have the benefit of principled free-marketers and the tax-paying groups that oppose the reform. What would libertarians think, many of whom already believe that Republicans are as bad fiscally as Democrats?
Are Republicans suppose to think David Frum has their best interest at heat, given how ludicrous his criticisms is, and how politically disastrous his advice would be? Are free-marketers supposed to think Bruce Bartlett is still a serious intellectual, given his shallow and almost dogmatically Social Democratic views?
And are observers of the AEI-Frum controversy who know the basics of free-market liberalism suppose to believe that intellectual at the AEI secretly admired Obama´s ruinous plan? David Frum would not have wasted my time and that of others had he just beeen more honest about who he has turned into.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Report on time use
For Swedish readers only:
Today I release a report on the distribution of work, leisure and home production in Sweden, the U.S and Europe. The report is in Swedish. Also a short article in Swedish where we summarize our results.
One of the results is that the poor work less, so that income inequality would be reduced by about 25%. Another result is that female managers and female self-employed work substantially less than male managers and self-employed.
Lots of other results in there, so take a look if you are interested in these topics.
Today I release a report on the distribution of work, leisure and home production in Sweden, the U.S and Europe. The report is in Swedish. Also a short article in Swedish where we summarize our results.
One of the results is that the poor work less, so that income inequality would be reduced by about 25%. Another result is that female managers and female self-employed work substantially less than male managers and self-employed.
Lots of other results in there, so take a look if you are interested in these topics.
Monday, March 22, 2010
Bait and Switch: Since high-skill immigration is good, let's continue our policy of low-skilled immigration!
Thomas Friedman points out that a disproportional number of the finalists of 2010 Intel Science Talent Search are of immigrant origin. He puts up these names:
"Linda Zhou, Alice Wei Zhao, Lori Ying, Angela Yu-Yun Yeung, Lynnelle Lin Ye, Kevin Young Xu, Benjamin Chang Sun, Jane Yoonhae Suh, Katheryn Cheng Shi, Sunanda Sharma, Sarine Gayaneh Shahmirian, Arjun Ranganath Puranik, Raman Venkat Nelakant, Akhil Mathew, Paul Masih Das, David Chienyun Liu, Elisa Bisi Lin, Yifan Li, Lanair Amaad Lett, Ruoyi Jiang, Otana Agape Jakpor, Peter Danming Hu, Yale Wang Fan, Yuval Yaacov Calev, Levent Alpoge, John Vincenzo Capodilupo and Namrata Anand."
and concludes:
"Indeed, if you need any more convincing about the virtues of immigration, just come to the Intel science finals. I am a pro-immigration fanatic. I think keeping a constant flow of legal immigrants into our country — whether they wear blue collars or lab coats — is the key to keeping us ahead of China."
Is Friedman's list a logical argument in favor of current American immigration policy?
Well, let us note that fully 54% of the foreign born population of the U.S is from Mexico and the rest of Latin America. Only 9% are from India and China. Even if you don't ignore illegal immigrants, there are several times as many legal immigrants from Latin America as there are from India and China.
Yet, of the 40 finalists, not a single one seems to be from Latin America! (correct me if I am wrong. John Vincenzo Capodilupo sounds Italian). His list is almost entirely made up of Indians and Chinese kids.
In 2008 only 15% of legal immigration was based on employment or skills, the remaining 85% is skill unrelated things such as having relatives in U.S. This is Americas current immigration policy: take a few high skilled people and masses of lower skilled immigrants.
Thomas Friedman presents us with a very valuable piece of information, which is that high-skill immigrants are very innovative. He inadvertently illustrated that low-skilled immigrants are not very innovative. Americas current immigration policy is taking mostly low-skilled immigrants, and few high skilled immigrants.
Yet instead of drawing the logical conclusion from it, the NYT farcically wants to use the success of the high skilled as an argument in favor or continuing the current American policy of mass-low skill immigrant.
"Linda Zhou, Alice Wei Zhao, Lori Ying, Angela Yu-Yun Yeung, Lynnelle Lin Ye, Kevin Young Xu, Benjamin Chang Sun, Jane Yoonhae Suh, Katheryn Cheng Shi, Sunanda Sharma, Sarine Gayaneh Shahmirian, Arjun Ranganath Puranik, Raman Venkat Nelakant, Akhil Mathew, Paul Masih Das, David Chienyun Liu, Elisa Bisi Lin, Yifan Li, Lanair Amaad Lett, Ruoyi Jiang, Otana Agape Jakpor, Peter Danming Hu, Yale Wang Fan, Yuval Yaacov Calev, Levent Alpoge, John Vincenzo Capodilupo and Namrata Anand."
and concludes:
"Indeed, if you need any more convincing about the virtues of immigration, just come to the Intel science finals. I am a pro-immigration fanatic. I think keeping a constant flow of legal immigrants into our country — whether they wear blue collars or lab coats — is the key to keeping us ahead of China."
Is Friedman's list a logical argument in favor of current American immigration policy?
Well, let us note that fully 54% of the foreign born population of the U.S is from Mexico and the rest of Latin America. Only 9% are from India and China. Even if you don't ignore illegal immigrants, there are several times as many legal immigrants from Latin America as there are from India and China.
Yet, of the 40 finalists, not a single one seems to be from Latin America! (correct me if I am wrong. John Vincenzo Capodilupo sounds Italian). His list is almost entirely made up of Indians and Chinese kids.
In 2008 only 15% of legal immigration was based on employment or skills, the remaining 85% is skill unrelated things such as having relatives in U.S. This is Americas current immigration policy: take a few high skilled people and masses of lower skilled immigrants.
Thomas Friedman presents us with a very valuable piece of information, which is that high-skill immigrants are very innovative. He inadvertently illustrated that low-skilled immigrants are not very innovative. Americas current immigration policy is taking mostly low-skilled immigrants, and few high skilled immigrants.
Yet instead of drawing the logical conclusion from it, the NYT farcically wants to use the success of the high skilled as an argument in favor or continuing the current American policy of mass-low skill immigrant.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Obama-care bad for America, good for republicans
Some people on the left have claimed passing health care will not hurt them in the 2010 midterms, because the damage in public opinion was already done. The prediction markets seem to disagree.
As the probability of health care passing went from 40% in the beginning March to close to 100%, the probability of Republican taking congress went from 42% in to 48% as of writing. Since the market's already calculated some probability of health care passing at this point, the marginal increase from the bill is 6/0.6=10% points.
Especially on Sunday there was heavy trading in the probability of republicans re-taking the house around the time the Stupak deal was announced.
Going by the results on Sunday, a 15% increase in the probability of heath care passing translated into a 2% increase in the probability of Republicans winning the house, implying that health care led to a 2/0.15=13% higher chance of Republicans taking over the house.
Some admit that passing health care was bad for congressional Democrats, but necessary for Obama. However the probability that Obama is re-elected did not increase from March to now, nor did it change on Sunday. If anything it went down a little.
The Democrats are still favored to hold the house. But if we believe the prediction markets (which I always do), passing health care has made it around 10% points more likely that republicans will take over the house.
As the probability of health care passing went from 40% in the beginning March to close to 100%, the probability of Republican taking congress went from 42% in to 48% as of writing. Since the market's already calculated some probability of health care passing at this point, the marginal increase from the bill is 6/0.6=10% points.
Especially on Sunday there was heavy trading in the probability of republicans re-taking the house around the time the Stupak deal was announced.
Going by the results on Sunday, a 15% increase in the probability of heath care passing translated into a 2% increase in the probability of Republicans winning the house, implying that health care led to a 2/0.15=13% higher chance of Republicans taking over the house.
Some admit that passing health care was bad for congressional Democrats, but necessary for Obama. However the probability that Obama is re-elected did not increase from March to now, nor did it change on Sunday. If anything it went down a little.
The Democrats are still favored to hold the house. But if we believe the prediction markets (which I always do), passing health care has made it around 10% points more likely that republicans will take over the house.
The ethnic divide in health care opinion
Some very interesting data in a new poll by Pew.
1. Obama has an approval rating of 46% and a disapproval of 43% (+3%) among all adults. Among registered voters, it is 45-45 (+-0%).
2. The support for Obama based on income is U-shaped. Those earning more than $100.000 and less than $30.000 support him the most, the middle class supports him the least.
3. There are massive racial gaps in Obama's support. Only 35% of non-Hispanic whites approve of the job Obama is doing as President, compared to 85% of African Americans (not surprising), and 61% of Hispanics.
I exclude those who do not answer and compare this with Obama's results in the exit poll reported by CNN:
Loss of support:
Non-Hispanic Whites: -3.2%
African Americans and Hispanics: -2.2%
What is remarkable is if we don't calculate percentage points, but percentage.
Obama started with a paltry 43.9% among non-Hispanic whites. He is down 3.2% points, which is 7.3% of 43.9%.
Loss of Obama support among whites: -7.3%
Loss of Obama support among Hispanics: -5.1%
Loss of Obama support among African Americans: -1.6%
Let me remind you once again: these are percentage of total votes, not percentage points which are usually reported.
This confirms with the theory that Hispanic voters on the margin follow the same trends as white voters, just with a much higher mean for Democrats.
I also predict that regardless of what happens during the Obama-presidency, his support among African Americans in 2012 exit polls will not go below 90%.
4. The support for the health care bill is 38% among all adults, and only 48% among the uninsured. This last figure is really remarkable. Even the constituency Obama is trying to bribe do not love his bill.
5. There are staggering racial gaps regarding the health care bill. Only 30% of non-Hispanic white voters support the Democrat health care bill. Among African Americans the support is 67%, and among Hispanics 59%.
While net support is -28% for whites, it is +33% for Hispanics. Fully 30% of the uninsured are Hispanic. The demographic transformation is driving the U.S towards the left. This is both through making the electorate ideologically more leftist, and through increasing groups in need for government assistance.
My interpretation is that if it would have not been for immigration policy the last 40 years, the takeover of the health care sector voted for today would not have take place.
This is an important lesson for libertarians who support open borders. You have to choose: if you want left-libertarian immigration politics you have to accept the United States slowly turning into a social-democratic welfare state.
This dilemma is part of reality and must therefore be confronted, it is not something you can wish or assume away in a theoretical discussion.
1. Obama has an approval rating of 46% and a disapproval of 43% (+3%) among all adults. Among registered voters, it is 45-45 (+-0%).
2. The support for Obama based on income is U-shaped. Those earning more than $100.000 and less than $30.000 support him the most, the middle class supports him the least.
3. There are massive racial gaps in Obama's support. Only 35% of non-Hispanic whites approve of the job Obama is doing as President, compared to 85% of African Americans (not surprising), and 61% of Hispanics.
I exclude those who do not answer and compare this with Obama's results in the exit poll reported by CNN:
Loss of support:
Non-Hispanic Whites: -3.2%
African Americans and Hispanics: -2.2%
What is remarkable is if we don't calculate percentage points, but percentage.
Obama started with a paltry 43.9% among non-Hispanic whites. He is down 3.2% points, which is 7.3% of 43.9%.
Loss of Obama support among whites: -7.3%
Loss of Obama support among Hispanics: -5.1%
Loss of Obama support among African Americans: -1.6%
Let me remind you once again: these are percentage of total votes, not percentage points which are usually reported.
This confirms with the theory that Hispanic voters on the margin follow the same trends as white voters, just with a much higher mean for Democrats.
I also predict that regardless of what happens during the Obama-presidency, his support among African Americans in 2012 exit polls will not go below 90%.
4. The support for the health care bill is 38% among all adults, and only 48% among the uninsured. This last figure is really remarkable. Even the constituency Obama is trying to bribe do not love his bill.
5. There are staggering racial gaps regarding the health care bill. Only 30% of non-Hispanic white voters support the Democrat health care bill. Among African Americans the support is 67%, and among Hispanics 59%.
While net support is -28% for whites, it is +33% for Hispanics. Fully 30% of the uninsured are Hispanic. The demographic transformation is driving the U.S towards the left. This is both through making the electorate ideologically more leftist, and through increasing groups in need for government assistance.
My interpretation is that if it would have not been for immigration policy the last 40 years, the takeover of the health care sector voted for today would not have take place.
This is an important lesson for libertarians who support open borders. You have to choose: if you want left-libertarian immigration politics you have to accept the United States slowly turning into a social-democratic welfare state.
This dilemma is part of reality and must therefore be confronted, it is not something you can wish or assume away in a theoretical discussion.
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