Beyond the significant financial expenses required to conduct RCTs … critics have raised concerns about considerable opportunity costs associated with their privileged status in programme and policy assessment. These costs result from how an over-emphasis on experimental evaluations in evidence generation systematically undermines alternative research methods potentially better equipped to answer questions about causal mechanisms (or the channels by which interventions...

This popped on the ABA Journal as written by Attorney Erwin Chemerinsky. Erwin is the guy to follow when it comes to the impact of certain cases on the US citizenry. Today, he is identifying several rulings which may have a bearing of election results. In fact, he is saying such towards the end of his article. Hopefully, he is wrong and the court rejects it if it comes to the court. One could always hope. Commenter Jack usually has a good take...

What Bill Barr has said about Donald Trump: In May 2023, when asked whether Trump is fit to be president at a City Club of Cleveland event in Ohio, he responded: “If you believe in his policies, what he’s advertising is his policies, he’s the last person who could actually execute them and achieve them. He does not have the discipline, he does not have the ability for strategic thinking and linear thinking or setting priorities or how to get...

Finanspolitiska ramverkets konstruktör har ändrat sig I veckans avsnitt av Starta Pressarna  fortsätter debatten om det finanspolitiska ramverketoch behovet av stora framtida investeringar i infrastruktur, bostäder, försvar och energiomställning. Medverkande i det här avsnittet är — förutom Daniel Suhonen — Per Molander och Max Jerneck. Som alltid på den här podden — intressant, slagkraftigt och tankeväckande!

Another Monday Message Board. Post comments on any topic. Civil discussion and no coarse language please. Side discussions and idees fixes to the sandpits, please. I’m now using Substack as a blogging platform, and for my monthly email newsletter. For the moment, I’ll post both at this blog and on Substack. You can also follow me on Mastodon here. Share this:Like Loading...

The population of Argentina is suffering. The purchasing power of people who still have a job is down (a lot), and unemployment must have doubled (it was 5,7% in the last quarter of 2023) if it has not tripled. Less government spending, less consumer spending, and, no doubt, less private investment means that Argentina is experiencing an economic disaster which will scar the country for decades. Retail sales (volume): down around 20% while, at this moment, people will still be able to...

Israel is on a dangerously self-destructive course.  The brutality of the Gaza campaign is antagonizing allies and making it difficult for regional players to continue normalizing relations.  The prospects for a durable peace are dimming at the same time that the policy of military supremacy that provided a modicum of security over the past two decades looks increasingly unsustainable.  Netanyahu clearly deserves much of the blame for what is...

from Dean Baker The belief in free-market fundamentalism runs very deep. When I say that, I don’t mean that support for the concept runs deep, I mean the belief that we had been pursuing free-market policies in the years before the Trump and Biden presidency runs very deep. I was reminded of this fact in a New York Times column by Farah Stockman, touting the development of a new post-free-market fundamentalist paradigm. To be...

ZEIT: Wie stark die soziale Herkunft den Schulerfolg in Deutschland prägt, ist seit dem PisaSchock 2001 bekannt. Wieso bekommt man das Problem einfach nicht in den Griff? Maaz: Meine tiefe Überzeugung ist: Wenn wir mit Bildungsmaßnahmen erst anfangen, wenn die Kinder in die Schule kommen, werden wir nicht erfolgreich sein. Selbst das StartchancenProgramm, bei dem jetzt 4.000 Schulen in schwierigen Lagen mit Geld versorgt werden, greift in dieser Hinsicht zu kurz. Denn die...

Introduction: It appears HHS and CMS are taking action with Medicare Advantage plans and their payments to brokers selling Advantage plans. They allowed Kaiser Family Foundation healthcare to republish a Modern Healthcare article. I am lucky enough to have access to and republished at Angry Bear. According to the article, “insurers increasingly not only pay commissions to brokers and agents but also contract with field marketing organizations...