Dean Baker

Imagine not being able to collect on a mortgage just because you can’t prove that you actually own it. That’s the situation that PHH Mortgage found itself in last week when a judge refused to enforce its claim because it could not establish clear ownership. For years courts have been very lax in allowing banks […]

The NYT reported that the Medicare drug plan has cost less than expected. This is true, however this is not necessarily due to the effective design of the program. The biggest reason that the program costs less than projected is that drug prices rose much less quickly in the years subsequent to the bills passage […]

Tyler Cowen issues dire warnings about the dangers of extending health care coverage without first controlling costs. He argued that other countries went the opposite path of controlling costs before extending coverage. Of course he misses the obvious point that the United States could directly take advantage of the success of other countries in controlling […]

The Post told readers that critics of proposals to limit greenhouse gas emissions: “say that curbing greenhouse gas emissions linked to climate change could lead to higher energy prices.” Actually, proponents claim that curbs on emissions will lead to higher energy prices also. That is how you get people to use less energy. The critics […]

An article about the limited ability of underwater homeowners to refinance makes repeated references to past housing booms and busts. The problem is that no prior post-depression boom and bust bears any similarity to this one. We are in the worst downturn since the Great Depression because the Greenspan-Bernanke crew allowed an $8 trillion housing […]

For readers who didn’t get enough information about the housing market from David Lereah, the widely cited former chief economist of the National Association of Realtors (NAR) and author of the Why the Real Estate Boom Will Not Bust and How You Can Profit from It, the WSJ is again presenting unchallenged assertions from the […]

The media insist on imposing a framing on policy issues that often has little to do with reality. For example, they have repeatedly insisted that the debate over creating a public Medicare-type plan is about ideology — the role of government in the economy — as opposed to a debate driven by on the one […]

Back in the spring, the Obama administration had no problem insisting that union autoworkers give up some of the health care benefits that they were entitled to in their contract. In some cases, workers had already put in more than 30 years earning these benefits. Note that this was before any of the manufacturers went […]

The Washington Post editorial board once again missed the boat in trying to argue the case against an audit of the Fed, getting both the facts and the logic wrong. Starting with the facts, the Post confidently told readers that: “it’s uncontroversial to keep Fed decisions about setting interest rates and other traditional functions confidential.” […]

Thomas Friedman is pushing his education line again. He tells readers that in today’s global economy only the movers and shakers with real initiative can get ahead. Everyone else will lose out to the low-paid competition in India and China. It must be comforting to those who draw large paychecks to believe that it is […]