Archive for June, 2009

Drugs Won the War

Published: June 13, 2009

This year marks the 40th anniversary of President Richard Nixon’s start of the war on drugs, and it now appears that drugs have won.

We’ve spent a trillion dollars prosecuting the war on drugs,” Norm Stamper, a former police chief of Seattle, told me. “What do we have to show for it? Drugs are more readily available, at lower prices and higher levels of potency. It’s a dismal failure.”

For that reason, he favors legalization of drugs, perhaps by the equivalent of state liquor stores or registered pharmacists. Other experts favor keeping drug production and sales illegal but decriminalizing possession, as some foreign countries have done.

Here in the United States, four decades of drug war have had three consequences:

First, we have vastly increased the proportion of our population in prisons.

The United States now incarcerates people at a rate nearly five times the world average. In part, that’s because the number of people in prison for drug offenses rose roughly from 41,000 in 1980 to 500,000 today.

Until the war on drugs, our incarceration rate was roughly the same as that of other countries.

Second, we have empowered criminals at home and terrorists abroad. One reason many prominent economists have favored easing drug laws is that interdiction raises prices, which increases profit margins for everyone, from the Latin drug cartels to the Taliban. Former presidents of Mexico, Brazil and Colombia this year jointly implored the United States to adopt a new approach to narcotics, based on the public health campaign against tobacco.

Third, we have squandered resources. Jeffrey Miron, a Harvard economist, found that federal, state and local governments spend $44.1 billion annually enforcing drug prohibitions. We spend seven times as much on drug interdiction, policing and imprisonment as on treatment.

Follow the Money in Health Care Debate

Congress appears ready to confront one of the nation’s most contentious issues — health care reform — and arguments will fill the air in the coming months.

Much of the discussion so far has focused on President Obama’s proposal for a government-sponsored health plan that he says will reduce costs. Insurers and doctors argue it will limit patient choice. Drug companies warn that the quality of care could be compromised.

Roughly $2.5 trillion is at stake, the amount the nation spends each year on health care, nearly a fifth of the American economy.

How that money is divided up — or prevented from rising at its current pace — is at the center of the debate. Many doctors, insurance companies and drug companies say they fear that their revenues could shrink significantly and patient care could be threatened.

As Congress gets closer to finalizing any legislation, the opinions of the many stakeholders are likely to become more strident and self-interested.

It’s getting pretty hard to stay optimistic in Detroit.

How much more pain does the state of Michigan have to endure?

The Detroit Red Wings gave us a great season.  Just wish they could of finished the job and won the cup for us.

This town really could of used the boost.

There’s Joy in Detroit

Red Wings fans showing their hometown pride during the Stanley Cup finals against the Penguins. Game 7 is Friday night in Detroit.

DETROIT — The Motor City has been hit by pretty much every crisis imaginable this last year, save for famine and a plague of grasshoppers.

Its mayor resigned and went to jail. Two of its three car companies wound up in bankruptcy. Unemployment soared to the highest level for any metropolitan area in the nation, and the wrecking crews showed up to take apart Detroit’s beloved Tiger Stadium.

But this week, sports is providing a much-needed lift to this beaten-down city.

The Red Wings face the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup finals Friday night, and Detroit is hoping for a repeat of last year’s championship.

Red Wings players, many of whom have grown traditional playoff beards, know they bear a special burden in giving Detroit a reason to celebrate.

“This has been an unbelievable run for our city and for our state, just because of the economy here,” Red Wings Coach Mike Babcock said. “It’s been absolutely fantastic. Now we’ve got to finish it off.”

Medical Bills Driving Majority of Middle Class Bankruptcy Filings

THURSDAY, June 4 (HealthDay News) — In 2007, medical problems and expenses contributed to nearly two-thirds of all bankruptcies in the United States, a jump of nearly 50 percent from 2001, new research has found.

Since the data used in the study were collected prior to the current economic downturn, it’s likely that the current rate of medical-related bankruptcies is even higher, said the researchers at Harvard Law School, Harvard Medical School and Ohio University.

Most of those bankrupted by medical problems were “solidly middle class” before they suffered financial disaster — two-thirds were homeowners and three-fifths had gone to college. In many cases, these people were hit at the same time by high medical bills and loss of income as illness forced breadwinners to take time off work. It was common for illness to lead to job loss and the disappearance of work-based health insurance.

“Our findings are frightening. Unless you’re Warren Buffett, your family is just one serious illness away from bankruptcy,” lead author Dr. David Himmelstein, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, said in a news release from the Physicians for a National Health Program.

“For middle-class Americans, health insurance offers little protection. Most of us have policies with so many loopholes, co-payments and deductibles that illness can put you in the poorhouse.

Even the best job-based health insurance often vanishes when a prolonged illness causes job loss — precisely when families need it most. Private health insurance is a defective product, akin to an umbrella that melts in the rain,” Himmelstein said.

The New ‘Good Job’ $12 an Hour?

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Massive investment in renewable energy could ultimately create 4 million manufacturing jobs. But for the workers in the bottom rung of this movement, the shift to green jobs could very well mean a pay cut of nearly 60%, a trend spreading across the entire manufacturing sector.

Many of the entry-level jobs making green energy components start at $12 an hour, much less than the now extinct $28 an hour job that had allowed high school-educated workers in the auto sector to achieve middle class status.

Americans are betting that molding steel wind turbines, slicing silicon for solar panels and making batteries for electric cars will put them back on top of the manufacturing game. The 4 million new jobs, estimated by the University of California, Berkeley, would bring back more than half of all the manufacturing jobs lost in this country since the sector’s heyday in the late 1970s.

At a battery plant just outside Indiana, job growth could boom. The plant is owned by EnerDel, the car battery division of Ener1. Here, the company is racing to build a cost competitive battery for an all-electric car. If it gets a government loan it’s applying for, the company plans on hiring up to 3,000 people. That’s roughly what a big auto plant employs.

But $12 an hour is the starting wage for a production worker.

A level pay scale. The diversity of jobs in the renewable energy business is one thing supporters of green manufacturing tout. They say people should look beyond the starting wages for labor when judging the industry.

“I cannot think of an industry that has more diversity in wages,” said Jackie Roberts, director of sustainable technology at the Environmental Defense Fund.

GM Plant Closures Will Hit Michigan Hard

General Motor Corp. is drastically shrinking its footprint in Michigan, closing another six factories by the end of next year. The company announced the names of the 11 plants that will close by the end of next year — and a 12th that will close in 2011.

GM will close Lake Orion assembly by September — though it will be on standby — and close permanently its Pontiac assembly plant by October. The Spring Hill, Tenn. plant will close in November and also go on standby. GM’s Wilmington, Del., plant will close next month.

On the powertrain side, Livonia Engine will close in June 2010, Flint North Components in December 2010, Willow Run in December 2010, Parma Components in December 2010 and Fredericksburg, Va., components in December 2010.