Question:
NAFTA has failed to give Mexico a competitive edge in the global economy.

Although NAFTA gives Mexico a slight advantage over its competitors, this edge has been insufficient; Chinese labor is still cheaper, and imports more goods to the US than Mexico does1. Real wages in Mexico have actually decreased 0.2% and income disparities between Mexico and the US have grown2. In failing to provide sufficient means for Mexico to compete with other developing nations, NAFTA has failed to serve its parties' interests.

1 Smith, Geri and Cristina Lindblad. "Mexico: Was NAFTA Worth it: A Tale of What Free Trade Can and Cannot Do." Business Week, December 22, 2003.

2 Stiglitz, Joseph E. "The Broken Promise of NAFTA." New York Times, January 6, 2004.

NAFTA gave Mexico an edge; that does not mean Mexico's problems would disappear. Mexico's economic problems are the result of a low tax base and poor education, among other issues1. A trade agreement alone cannot solve a nation's complex socioeconomic issues. Though it is impossible to know what would have happened, it is fair to speculate that Mexico would import even fewer goods to the US if not for NAFTA. Therefore, even if Mexico has yet to become an industrial powerhouse, NAFTA can still be considered advantageous.

1 Joseph E. Stiglitz, "The Broken Promise of NAFTA," New York Times, January 6, 2004

The change need not be dramatic; it need not apply to all oil revenues at once. For example only revenues from new fields could go into the independent fund while existing revenues to the government are maintained. Services therefore won’t need to undergo contraction.

The impact on politics would also be minor; people elect those who get things done not those who blame others for their problems. Moreover all of the politicians will have the same constraint of a lack of funds so no single party will have an unfair advantage.

The bidding process is not too long and does not tie up funds or land that would otherwise be developed. Furthermore, the Olympic bidding process would not be as difficult, expensive or long if the benefits to the eventual victor were not deemed worth all the time and effort. The unsuccessful bids are not wasted, the plans drawn up and experience of the process can be utilized for later bids. Moreover, the exposure granted to land earmarked for Olympic redevelopment can both generate interest in the area and lead to further development in the area regardless of an unsuccessful Olympic bid. The bidding process is now open and trustworthy. Whilst the 1998 Salt Lake City scandal did reveal huge levels of endemic corruption, IOC president Jacques Rogge has taken significant steps to stamp it out. Cities can now be confident that the best bid will win and that they should not be put of bidding to host because they fear they will lose simply for not being corrupt enough.

The bribery of foreign officials cannot be fought by international means efficiently if the level of corruption at the national level is high. It depends on the political will of national governments, the activities of civil society and other social conditions that exists inside the state. This explains why in many countries there has been little enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials. [1] In most OECD countries the political will to prosecute major bribery cases is lacking. This explains why international efforts to combat corruption are inefficient.

[1] Transparency International, ‘2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, 22 June 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/4th_oecd_progress_report

Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.

A range of health programs are already available. Many employers offer health insurance and some people deliberately choose to work for such companies for these benefits, even if the pay is a little lower. Other plans can be purchased by individuals with no need to rely on an employer. This means they are free to choose the level of care which is most appropriate to their needs. For other people it can be perfectly reasonable to decide to go without health insurance. Healthy younger adults will on average save money by choosing not to pay high insurance premiums, covering any necessary treatment out of their own pockets from time to time. Why should the state take away all these people’s freedom of choice by imposing a one-size-fits-all socialist system of health care?

Human resources professionals will still be needed to deal with the very many other employment regulations put in place by the federal government. Instead of employees being able to exercise control over their health care choices and work with people in their company, patients will be forced to deal with the nameless, faceless members of the government bureaucracy.

This leads to patients requesting drugs they do not need and in many cases are even harmful to them.

The prescription drugs are very different from freely available drugs. They often treat serious diseases, and so advertising those should target mainly people that are very ill and especially vulnerable. On the other hand, with direct-to-consumer advertising, many people who do not have a serious disease become convinced that they need the prescription drug, because the advertisements scare them.

Because of such advertisement, in the U.S. there was a rapid widespread exposure to dangerous drugs before risks were fully recognized, as with troglitazone (Rezulin) for diabetes and cisapride (Propulsid) for nighttime heartburn. Causing people to become more ill instead of healthier, because this leads to a higher “self-diagnosing”. [1]

[1] Health Information Action, Direct-to-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising The European Commission’s Proposals for Legislative Change, September 2011, http://www.haiweb.org/campaign/DTCA/BMintzes_en.pdf , accessed 08/07/2011

While people do indeed need proper rest and downtime in order to perform to their maximum potential, exactly how much rest they need changes from individual to individual. A "one size fits all" approach through legislation will necessarily mean that some people who could work quite comfortably with no ill effects will be prevented from doing so.

The choice to work or not rightly belongs to them, as does even their decision to risk their health. It might be worth it to someone to take a chance on sleep deprivation in order to earn more pay.

Training is indeed the answer but it makes sense for this to be done on the job rather than simply in lecture theatres. Where there are skills gaps these gaps should be filled by encouraging and paying for temporary jobs to help fill those roles. In this way the young people involved will gain the skills for an area of the economy where there are vacancies.

To tackle gender discrepancies an engendered strategy is required on land, not only housing.

For example, Gulyani and Connors (2002) illustrate the Kalingalinga slum upgrading project in Zambia resulted in negative effects for women. Following investment in slum upgrading the proportion of female-headed households declined with a rise in the proportion of renters and relocations. Slum upgrading raised living costs to women, and without legal land rights female-headed households were forced to relocate and resettle.

There are several reasons why health care should not be considered a universal human right.

The first issue is one of definition – how do we define the services that need to be rendered in order for them to qualify as adequate health care? Where do we draw the line? Emergency surgery, sure, but how about cosmetic surgery?

The second is that all human rights have a clear addressee, an entity that needs to protect this right. But who is targeted here? The government? What if we opt for a private yet universal health coverage – is this any less moral? Let’s forget the institutions for a second, should this moral duty of health care fall solely on the doctors perhaps? [1]

In essence, viewing health care as a right robs us of another, much more essential one – that of the right to one’s own life and one’s livelihood. If it is not considered a service to be rendered, than how could a doctor charge for it? She couldn’t! If it were a right, than each of us would own it, it would have to be inseparable from us. Yet, we don’t and we can’t. [2]

We can see that considering health care as a basic human right has profound philosophical problems, not the least of them the fact that it infringes on the rights of others.

[1] Barlow, P., Health care is not a human right, published 7/31/1999, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1126951/ , accessed 9/18/2011

[2] Sade, R., The Political Fallacy that Medical Care is a Right, published 12/2/1971, http://www.aapsonline.org/brochures/sademcr.htm , accessed 9/18/2011

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
NAFTA caused a severe trade imbalance between the US and its neighbors.

As NAFTA has allowed manufacturing to relocate south of the border and export to the United States the US has turned from having a trade surplus to a trade deficit. In 1993, the US had a trade surplus with Mexico and a stable deficit with Canada1. After NAFTA, the US' deficit with its neighbors increased $107.3 billion, creating a net displacement of over 1 million jobs. NAFTA was supposed to stimulate job growth in the US, not job loss; this failure demonstrates the harms that NAFTA has caused its members.

1 Scott, Robert, Carlos Salas, and Bruce Campbell. "Revisiting NAFTA: Still Not Good for North America's Workers." Economic Policy Institute, September 28, 2006.

The loss of US production jobs is part of a greater global trend; NAFTA is not responsible for this change. Mexico and Canada are responsible for only one-fifth of the growth in the US trade deficit. The rapid acceleration of technological communication has made outsourcing and offshore production easier than ever1, and the US is losing jobs to countries that do the work as a fraction of the cost.

1 Thomas L. Friedman, "The World is Flat: a Brief History of the Twenty-First Century," (New York: Picador, 2007), 148.

The change need not be dramatic; it need not apply to all oil revenues at once. For example only revenues from new fields could go into the independent fund while existing revenues to the government are maintained. Services therefore won’t need to undergo contraction.

The impact on politics would also be minor; people elect those who get things done not those who blame others for their problems. Moreover all of the politicians will have the same constraint of a lack of funds so no single party will have an unfair advantage.

The bidding process is not too long and does not tie up funds or land that would otherwise be developed. Furthermore, the Olympic bidding process would not be as difficult, expensive or long if the benefits to the eventual victor were not deemed worth all the time and effort. The unsuccessful bids are not wasted, the plans drawn up and experience of the process can be utilized for later bids. Moreover, the exposure granted to land earmarked for Olympic redevelopment can both generate interest in the area and lead to further development in the area regardless of an unsuccessful Olympic bid. The bidding process is now open and trustworthy. Whilst the 1998 Salt Lake City scandal did reveal huge levels of endemic corruption, IOC president Jacques Rogge has taken significant steps to stamp it out. Cities can now be confident that the best bid will win and that they should not be put of bidding to host because they fear they will lose simply for not being corrupt enough.

The bribery of foreign officials cannot be fought by international means efficiently if the level of corruption at the national level is high. It depends on the political will of national governments, the activities of civil society and other social conditions that exists inside the state. This explains why in many countries there has been little enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials. [1] In most OECD countries the political will to prosecute major bribery cases is lacking. This explains why international efforts to combat corruption are inefficient.

[1] Transparency International, ‘2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, 22 June 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/4th_oecd_progress_report

Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.

A range of health programs are already available. Many employers offer health insurance and some people deliberately choose to work for such companies for these benefits, even if the pay is a little lower. Other plans can be purchased by individuals with no need to rely on an employer. This means they are free to choose the level of care which is most appropriate to their needs. For other people it can be perfectly reasonable to decide to go without health insurance. Healthy younger adults will on average save money by choosing not to pay high insurance premiums, covering any necessary treatment out of their own pockets from time to time. Why should the state take away all these people’s freedom of choice by imposing a one-size-fits-all socialist system of health care?

Human resources professionals will still be needed to deal with the very many other employment regulations put in place by the federal government. Instead of employees being able to exercise control over their health care choices and work with people in their company, patients will be forced to deal with the nameless, faceless members of the government bureaucracy.

This leads to patients requesting drugs they do not need and in many cases are even harmful to them.

The prescription drugs are very different from freely available drugs. They often treat serious diseases, and so advertising those should target mainly people that are very ill and especially vulnerable. On the other hand, with direct-to-consumer advertising, many people who do not have a serious disease become convinced that they need the prescription drug, because the advertisements scare them.

Because of such advertisement, in the U.S. there was a rapid widespread exposure to dangerous drugs before risks were fully recognized, as with troglitazone (Rezulin) for diabetes and cisapride (Propulsid) for nighttime heartburn. Causing people to become more ill instead of healthier, because this leads to a higher “self-diagnosing”. [1]

[1] Health Information Action, Direct-to-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising The European Commission’s Proposals for Legislative Change, September 2011, http://www.haiweb.org/campaign/DTCA/BMintzes_en.pdf , accessed 08/07/2011

While people do indeed need proper rest and downtime in order to perform to their maximum potential, exactly how much rest they need changes from individual to individual. A "one size fits all" approach through legislation will necessarily mean that some people who could work quite comfortably with no ill effects will be prevented from doing so.

The choice to work or not rightly belongs to them, as does even their decision to risk their health. It might be worth it to someone to take a chance on sleep deprivation in order to earn more pay.

Training is indeed the answer but it makes sense for this to be done on the job rather than simply in lecture theatres. Where there are skills gaps these gaps should be filled by encouraging and paying for temporary jobs to help fill those roles. In this way the young people involved will gain the skills for an area of the economy where there are vacancies.

To tackle gender discrepancies an engendered strategy is required on land, not only housing.

For example, Gulyani and Connors (2002) illustrate the Kalingalinga slum upgrading project in Zambia resulted in negative effects for women. Following investment in slum upgrading the proportion of female-headed households declined with a rise in the proportion of renters and relocations. Slum upgrading raised living costs to women, and without legal land rights female-headed households were forced to relocate and resettle.

There are several reasons why health care should not be considered a universal human right.

The first issue is one of definition – how do we define the services that need to be rendered in order for them to qualify as adequate health care? Where do we draw the line? Emergency surgery, sure, but how about cosmetic surgery?

The second is that all human rights have a clear addressee, an entity that needs to protect this right. But who is targeted here? The government? What if we opt for a private yet universal health coverage – is this any less moral? Let’s forget the institutions for a second, should this moral duty of health care fall solely on the doctors perhaps? [1]

In essence, viewing health care as a right robs us of another, much more essential one – that of the right to one’s own life and one’s livelihood. If it is not considered a service to be rendered, than how could a doctor charge for it? She couldn’t! If it were a right, than each of us would own it, it would have to be inseparable from us. Yet, we don’t and we can’t. [2]

We can see that considering health care as a basic human right has profound philosophical problems, not the least of them the fact that it infringes on the rights of others.

[1] Barlow, P., Health care is not a human right, published 7/31/1999, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1126951/ , accessed 9/18/2011

[2] Sade, R., The Political Fallacy that Medical Care is a Right, published 12/2/1971, http://www.aapsonline.org/brochures/sademcr.htm , accessed 9/18/2011

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
NAFTA was severely damaging to independent Mexican farmers.

US farm subsidies make it impossible for Mexican farmers to compete without tariffs; the so-called free trade act disadvantages Mexican workers because their American counterparts are not working under a free trade system1. While Mexican consumers benefit from lower prices, rural farmers tend to be much poorer than city residents in Mexico. Therefore this agricultural loss benefits the rich at the expense of the poor1.

1 Joseph E. Stiglitz, "The Broken Promise of NAFTA," New York Times, January 6, 2004.

Corn is only one product in a complex trade system. While NAFTA has undoubtedly given US corn farmers an advantage, it has also benefited Mexican avocado famers- and everyone employed in the industry1. Automobile production has shifted away from the US and towards Mexico after NAFTA2. Each country cannot expect to export more of every product- what Mexico has lost in corn production, it has gained in other areas.

1Amy Clark, "Is NAFTA good for Mexico's Farmers?," CBS, February 11, 2009.

2 Scott, Robert, Carlos Salas, and Bruce Campbell. "Revisiting NAFTA: Still Not Good for North America's Workers." Economic Policy Institute, September 28, 2006.

The change need not be dramatic; it need not apply to all oil revenues at once. For example only revenues from new fields could go into the independent fund while existing revenues to the government are maintained. Services therefore won’t need to undergo contraction.

The impact on politics would also be minor; people elect those who get things done not those who blame others for their problems. Moreover all of the politicians will have the same constraint of a lack of funds so no single party will have an unfair advantage.

The bidding process is not too long and does not tie up funds or land that would otherwise be developed. Furthermore, the Olympic bidding process would not be as difficult, expensive or long if the benefits to the eventual victor were not deemed worth all the time and effort. The unsuccessful bids are not wasted, the plans drawn up and experience of the process can be utilized for later bids. Moreover, the exposure granted to land earmarked for Olympic redevelopment can both generate interest in the area and lead to further development in the area regardless of an unsuccessful Olympic bid. The bidding process is now open and trustworthy. Whilst the 1998 Salt Lake City scandal did reveal huge levels of endemic corruption, IOC president Jacques Rogge has taken significant steps to stamp it out. Cities can now be confident that the best bid will win and that they should not be put of bidding to host because they fear they will lose simply for not being corrupt enough.

The bribery of foreign officials cannot be fought by international means efficiently if the level of corruption at the national level is high. It depends on the political will of national governments, the activities of civil society and other social conditions that exists inside the state. This explains why in many countries there has been little enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials. [1] In most OECD countries the political will to prosecute major bribery cases is lacking. This explains why international efforts to combat corruption are inefficient.

[1] Transparency International, ‘2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, 22 June 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/4th_oecd_progress_report

Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.

A range of health programs are already available. Many employers offer health insurance and some people deliberately choose to work for such companies for these benefits, even if the pay is a little lower. Other plans can be purchased by individuals with no need to rely on an employer. This means they are free to choose the level of care which is most appropriate to their needs. For other people it can be perfectly reasonable to decide to go without health insurance. Healthy younger adults will on average save money by choosing not to pay high insurance premiums, covering any necessary treatment out of their own pockets from time to time. Why should the state take away all these people’s freedom of choice by imposing a one-size-fits-all socialist system of health care?

Human resources professionals will still be needed to deal with the very many other employment regulations put in place by the federal government. Instead of employees being able to exercise control over their health care choices and work with people in their company, patients will be forced to deal with the nameless, faceless members of the government bureaucracy.

This leads to patients requesting drugs they do not need and in many cases are even harmful to them.

The prescription drugs are very different from freely available drugs. They often treat serious diseases, and so advertising those should target mainly people that are very ill and especially vulnerable. On the other hand, with direct-to-consumer advertising, many people who do not have a serious disease become convinced that they need the prescription drug, because the advertisements scare them.

Because of such advertisement, in the U.S. there was a rapid widespread exposure to dangerous drugs before risks were fully recognized, as with troglitazone (Rezulin) for diabetes and cisapride (Propulsid) for nighttime heartburn. Causing people to become more ill instead of healthier, because this leads to a higher “self-diagnosing”. [1]

[1] Health Information Action, Direct-to-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising The European Commission’s Proposals for Legislative Change, September 2011, http://www.haiweb.org/campaign/DTCA/BMintzes_en.pdf , accessed 08/07/2011

While people do indeed need proper rest and downtime in order to perform to their maximum potential, exactly how much rest they need changes from individual to individual. A "one size fits all" approach through legislation will necessarily mean that some people who could work quite comfortably with no ill effects will be prevented from doing so.

The choice to work or not rightly belongs to them, as does even their decision to risk their health. It might be worth it to someone to take a chance on sleep deprivation in order to earn more pay.

Training is indeed the answer but it makes sense for this to be done on the job rather than simply in lecture theatres. Where there are skills gaps these gaps should be filled by encouraging and paying for temporary jobs to help fill those roles. In this way the young people involved will gain the skills for an area of the economy where there are vacancies.

To tackle gender discrepancies an engendered strategy is required on land, not only housing.

For example, Gulyani and Connors (2002) illustrate the Kalingalinga slum upgrading project in Zambia resulted in negative effects for women. Following investment in slum upgrading the proportion of female-headed households declined with a rise in the proportion of renters and relocations. Slum upgrading raised living costs to women, and without legal land rights female-headed households were forced to relocate and resettle.

There are several reasons why health care should not be considered a universal human right.

The first issue is one of definition – how do we define the services that need to be rendered in order for them to qualify as adequate health care? Where do we draw the line? Emergency surgery, sure, but how about cosmetic surgery?

The second is that all human rights have a clear addressee, an entity that needs to protect this right. But who is targeted here? The government? What if we opt for a private yet universal health coverage – is this any less moral? Let’s forget the institutions for a second, should this moral duty of health care fall solely on the doctors perhaps? [1]

In essence, viewing health care as a right robs us of another, much more essential one – that of the right to one’s own life and one’s livelihood. If it is not considered a service to be rendered, than how could a doctor charge for it? She couldn’t! If it were a right, than each of us would own it, it would have to be inseparable from us. Yet, we don’t and we can’t. [2]

We can see that considering health care as a basic human right has profound philosophical problems, not the least of them the fact that it infringes on the rights of others.

[1] Barlow, P., Health care is not a human right, published 7/31/1999, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1126951/ , accessed 9/18/2011

[2] Sade, R., The Political Fallacy that Medical Care is a Right, published 12/2/1971, http://www.aapsonline.org/brochures/sademcr.htm , accessed 9/18/2011

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Privatising social security will increase the amount of money that reitrees can draw on

Private accounts would provide retirees with a higher rate of return on investments. [1] Privatization would give investment decisions to account holders. This does not mean that Social Security money for the under 55’s would go to Wall Street.. This could be left to the individual's discretion. Potentially this could include government funds. But with government’s record of mismanagement, and a $14 trillion deficit, it seems unlikely that many people would join that choice. [2]

As Andrew Roth argues, "Democrats will say supporters of personal accounts will allow people's fragile retirement plans to be subjected to the whims of the stock market, but that's just more demagoguery. First, personal accounts would be voluntary. If you like the current system (the one that [can be raided by] politicians), you can stay put and be subjected to decreasingly low returns as Social Security goes bankrupt. But if you want your money protected from politicians and have the opportunity to invest in the same financial assets that politicians invest in their own retirement plans (most are well-diversified long term funds), then you should have that option." [3

Social Security privatization would actually help the economically marginalised in two ways. Firstly, by ending the harm social security currently does; Those at the poverty level need every cent just to survive. Even those in the lower-middle class don’t money to put into a wealth-generating retirement account. They have to rely on social security income to pay the bills when they reach retirement. Unfortunately, current social security pay-outs are at or below the poverty level. The money earned in benefits based on a retiree’s contributions during their working life is less than the return on a passbook savings account. [4]

Secondly, these same groups would be amongst the biggest 'winners' from privatization. By providing a much higher rate of return, privatization would raise the incomes of those elderly retirees who are most in need.

The current system contains many inequities that leave the poor at a disadvantage. For instance, the low-income elderly are most likely to be dependent on Social Security benefits for most or all of their retirement income. But despite a progressive benefit structure, Social Security benefits are inadequate for the elderly poor's retirement needs. [5]

Privatizing Social Security would improve individual liberty. Privatization would give all Americans the opportunity to participate in the economy through investments. Everyone would become capitalists and stock owners reducing the division of labour and capital and restoring the ownership that was the initial foundation of the American dream. [6]

Moreover, privatized accounts would be transferable within families, which current Social Security accounts are not. These privatized accounts would be personal assets, much like a house or a 401k account. On death, privatised social security accounts could pass to an individual’s heirs. With the current system, this cannot be done. Workers who have spent their lives paying withholding taxes are, in effect, denied a proprietary claim over money that, by rights, belongs to them. [7]

This would make privatization a progressive move. Because the wealthy generally live longer than the poor, they receive a higher total of Social Security payments over the course of their lifetimes. This would be evened out if remaining benefits could be passed on. [8] Privatizing Social Security increases personal choice and gives people control over what they paid and thus are entitled to. Overall, therefore, privatizing Social Security would increase the amount of money that marginalised retirees receive and would give all retirees more freedom to invest and distribute social security payments.

[1] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html

[2] Roth, Andrew. "Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/?postID=14110

[3] Roth, Andrew. "Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/?postID=14110

[4] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html

[5] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html

[6] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html

[7] Roth, Andrew. "Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/?postID=14110

[8] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html

Nobel Laureate economist Paul Krugman. Argued in 2004 that: “Social Security is a government program that works, a demonstration that a modest amount of taxing and spending can make people's lives better and more secure. And that's why the right wants to destroy it." [1] The problem with Social Security is not that it does not work, nor that it fails the poor. Rather, as Krugman notes, social security uses limited taxation to implement a clear and successful vision of social justice. As a consequence, the social security system has been repeatedly attacked by right wing and libertarian politicians. Such attacks are not motivated by the merits or failure of the social security system itself, but by political ambition and a desire to forcefully implement alternative normative schema within society.

Privatizing Social Security would require costly new government bureaucracies. From the standpoint of the system as a whole, privatization would add enormous administrative burdens – and costs. The government would need to establish and track many small accounts, perhaps as many accounts as there are taxpaying workers—157 million in 2010. [2] Often these accounts would be too small so that profit making firms would be unwilling to take them on. There would need to be thousands of workers to manage these accounts. In contrast, today’s Social Security has minimal administrative costs amounting to less than 1 per cent of annual revenues. [3]

It is also unlikely that individuals will be able to invest successfully on their own, although they may believe they can, leading to a great number of retirees actually being worse off after privatization.

[1] Paul Krugman. "Inventing a crisis." New York Times. 7 December 2004. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/07/opinion/07krugman.html?_r=2&scp=539&sq...

[2] Wihbey, John, ‘2011 Annual Report by the Social Security Board of Trustees’, Journalist’s Resource, 9 June 2011, http://journalistsresource.org/studies/government/politics/social-security-report-2011/

[3] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. "Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf

The change need not be dramatic; it need not apply to all oil revenues at once. For example only revenues from new fields could go into the independent fund while existing revenues to the government are maintained. Services therefore won’t need to undergo contraction.

The impact on politics would also be minor; people elect those who get things done not those who blame others for their problems. Moreover all of the politicians will have the same constraint of a lack of funds so no single party will have an unfair advantage.

The bidding process is not too long and does not tie up funds or land that would otherwise be developed. Furthermore, the Olympic bidding process would not be as difficult, expensive or long if the benefits to the eventual victor were not deemed worth all the time and effort. The unsuccessful bids are not wasted, the plans drawn up and experience of the process can be utilized for later bids. Moreover, the exposure granted to land earmarked for Olympic redevelopment can both generate interest in the area and lead to further development in the area regardless of an unsuccessful Olympic bid. The bidding process is now open and trustworthy. Whilst the 1998 Salt Lake City scandal did reveal huge levels of endemic corruption, IOC president Jacques Rogge has taken significant steps to stamp it out. Cities can now be confident that the best bid will win and that they should not be put of bidding to host because they fear they will lose simply for not being corrupt enough.

The bribery of foreign officials cannot be fought by international means efficiently if the level of corruption at the national level is high. It depends on the political will of national governments, the activities of civil society and other social conditions that exists inside the state. This explains why in many countries there has been little enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials. [1] In most OECD countries the political will to prosecute major bribery cases is lacking. This explains why international efforts to combat corruption are inefficient.

[1] Transparency International, ‘2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, 22 June 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/4th_oecd_progress_report

Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.

A range of health programs are already available. Many employers offer health insurance and some people deliberately choose to work for such companies for these benefits, even if the pay is a little lower. Other plans can be purchased by individuals with no need to rely on an employer. This means they are free to choose the level of care which is most appropriate to their needs. For other people it can be perfectly reasonable to decide to go without health insurance. Healthy younger adults will on average save money by choosing not to pay high insurance premiums, covering any necessary treatment out of their own pockets from time to time. Why should the state take away all these people’s freedom of choice by imposing a one-size-fits-all socialist system of health care?

Human resources professionals will still be needed to deal with the very many other employment regulations put in place by the federal government. Instead of employees being able to exercise control over their health care choices and work with people in their company, patients will be forced to deal with the nameless, faceless members of the government bureaucracy.

This leads to patients requesting drugs they do not need and in many cases are even harmful to them.

The prescription drugs are very different from freely available drugs. They often treat serious diseases, and so advertising those should target mainly people that are very ill and especially vulnerable. On the other hand, with direct-to-consumer advertising, many people who do not have a serious disease become convinced that they need the prescription drug, because the advertisements scare them.

Because of such advertisement, in the U.S. there was a rapid widespread exposure to dangerous drugs before risks were fully recognized, as with troglitazone (Rezulin) for diabetes and cisapride (Propulsid) for nighttime heartburn. Causing people to become more ill instead of healthier, because this leads to a higher “self-diagnosing”. [1]

[1] Health Information Action, Direct-to-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising The European Commission’s Proposals for Legislative Change, September 2011, http://www.haiweb.org/campaign/DTCA/BMintzes_en.pdf , accessed 08/07/2011

While people do indeed need proper rest and downtime in order to perform to their maximum potential, exactly how much rest they need changes from individual to individual. A "one size fits all" approach through legislation will necessarily mean that some people who could work quite comfortably with no ill effects will be prevented from doing so.

The choice to work or not rightly belongs to them, as does even their decision to risk their health. It might be worth it to someone to take a chance on sleep deprivation in order to earn more pay.

Training is indeed the answer but it makes sense for this to be done on the job rather than simply in lecture theatres. Where there are skills gaps these gaps should be filled by encouraging and paying for temporary jobs to help fill those roles. In this way the young people involved will gain the skills for an area of the economy where there are vacancies.

To tackle gender discrepancies an engendered strategy is required on land, not only housing.

For example, Gulyani and Connors (2002) illustrate the Kalingalinga slum upgrading project in Zambia resulted in negative effects for women. Following investment in slum upgrading the proportion of female-headed households declined with a rise in the proportion of renters and relocations. Slum upgrading raised living costs to women, and without legal land rights female-headed households were forced to relocate and resettle.

There are several reasons why health care should not be considered a universal human right.

The first issue is one of definition – how do we define the services that need to be rendered in order for them to qualify as adequate health care? Where do we draw the line? Emergency surgery, sure, but how about cosmetic surgery?

The second is that all human rights have a clear addressee, an entity that needs to protect this right. But who is targeted here? The government? What if we opt for a private yet universal health coverage – is this any less moral? Let’s forget the institutions for a second, should this moral duty of health care fall solely on the doctors perhaps? [1]

In essence, viewing health care as a right robs us of another, much more essential one – that of the right to one’s own life and one’s livelihood. If it is not considered a service to be rendered, than how could a doctor charge for it? She couldn’t! If it were a right, than each of us would own it, it would have to be inseparable from us. Yet, we don’t and we can’t. [2]

We can see that considering health care as a basic human right has profound philosophical problems, not the least of them the fact that it infringes on the rights of others.

[1] Barlow, P., Health care is not a human right, published 7/31/1999, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1126951/ , accessed 9/18/2011

[2] Sade, R., The Political Fallacy that Medical Care is a Right, published 12/2/1971, http://www.aapsonline.org/brochures/sademcr.htm , accessed 9/18/2011

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
The social security system is unsustainable in the status quo

Social Security is in Crisis. Social Security in the United States, as in most western liberal democracies, is a pay-as-you-go system and has always been so. As such, it is an intergenerational wealth transfer. The solvency of the system therefore relies on favourable demographics; particularly birth rate and longevity. In the United States the birth rate when Social Security was created was 2.3 children per woman but had risen to 3.0 by 1950. Today it is 2.06. The average life expectancy in 1935 was 63 and today it is 75. While this may be representative of an improvement in quality-of-life for many Americans, these demographic changes also indicate the increasing burden that social security systems are being put under. [1]

As a result of changing demographic factors, the number of workers paying Social Security payroll taxes has gone from 16 for every retiree in 1950 to just 3.3 in 1997. This ration will continue to decline to just 2 to 1 by 2025. This has meant the tax has been increased thirty times in sixty-two years to compensate. Originally it was just 2 percent on a maximum taxable income of $300, now it is 12.4 percent of a maximum income of $65,400. This will have to be raised to 18 percent to pay for all promised current benefits, and if Medicare is included the tax will have to go to nearly 28 percent. [2]

Social Security is an unsuitable approach to protecting the welfare of a retiring workforce. The social security system as it stands is unsustainable, and will place an excessive tax burden on the current working population of the USA, who will be expected to pay for the impending retirement of almost 70 million members of the “baby boomer” generation. This crisis is likely to begin in 2016 when- according to experts- more money will be paid out by the federal government in social security benefits than it will receive in payroll taxes. [3]

In many ways Social Security has now just become a giant ponzi scheme. As the Cato Institute has argued: “Just like Ponzi's plan, Social Security does not make any real investments -- it just takes money from later 'investors' or taxpayers, to pay benefits to the scheme’s earlier, now retired, entrants. Like Ponzi, Social Security will not be able to recruit new "investors" fast enough to continue paying promised benefits to previous investors. Because each year there are fewer young workers relative to the number of retirees, Social Security will eventually collapse, just like Ponzi's scheme.” [4]

Faced with this impending crisis, privatizing is at worst the best of the 'bad' options. It provides an opportunity to make the system sustainable and to make it fair to all generations by having everyone pay for their own retirement rather than someone else’s. [5]

[1] Crane, Edward. "The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System." CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html

[2] Crane, Edward. "The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System." CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html

[3] San Diego Union Tribune. "Privatizing Social Security Still a Good Idea." San Diego Union Tribune. http://www.creators.com/opinion/daily-editorials/privatizing-social-security-still-a-good-idea.html

[4] Cato Institute. “Why is Social Security often called a Ponzi scheme?”. Cato Institute. 11 May 1999. http://www.socialsecurity.org/daily/05-11-99.html ;

[5] Kotlikoff, Lawrence. "Privatizing social security the right way". Testimony to the Committee on Ways and Means. 3 June 3 1998. http://people.bu.edu/kotlikof/Ways&Means.pdf

Social Security is not in crisis and there is no need for privatization. Social Security is completely solvent today, and will be into the future because it has a dedicated income stream that covers its costs and consistently generates a surplus, which today is $2.5 trillion.

Proposition’s dire prediction of the collapse of social security’s financial situation is misleading. The Social Security surplus will grow to approximately $4.3 trillion in 2023, and that reserves will be sufficient to pay full benefits through to 2037. Even after this it would still be able to pay 78%. Moreover, there are plenty of ways to reform Social Security to make it more fiscally sound without privatizing it, including simply raising taxes to fund it better. [1]

Furthermore the problem that affects social security of falling numbers of contributors to each retiree will also affect private pensions, at least in the short to medium term, just in a different way. If all younger pensioners went over to just paying for their own future retirement who is to pay for current retirees or those who are shortly to retire. These people will still need to have their pensions paid for. They will not have time to save up a personal pension and so will be relying on current workers – but such workers will not want to pay more when they are explicitly just paying for someone else as they are already paying for themselves separately.

[1] Roosevelt, James."Social Security at 75: Crisis Is More Myth Than Fact." Huffington Post. 11 August 11 2010. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-roosevelt/social-security-at-75-cri_...

The change need not be dramatic; it need not apply to all oil revenues at once. For example only revenues from new fields could go into the independent fund while existing revenues to the government are maintained. Services therefore won’t need to undergo contraction.

The impact on politics would also be minor; people elect those who get things done not those who blame others for their problems. Moreover all of the politicians will have the same constraint of a lack of funds so no single party will have an unfair advantage.

The bidding process is not too long and does not tie up funds or land that would otherwise be developed. Furthermore, the Olympic bidding process would not be as difficult, expensive or long if the benefits to the eventual victor were not deemed worth all the time and effort. The unsuccessful bids are not wasted, the plans drawn up and experience of the process can be utilized for later bids. Moreover, the exposure granted to land earmarked for Olympic redevelopment can both generate interest in the area and lead to further development in the area regardless of an unsuccessful Olympic bid. The bidding process is now open and trustworthy. Whilst the 1998 Salt Lake City scandal did reveal huge levels of endemic corruption, IOC president Jacques Rogge has taken significant steps to stamp it out. Cities can now be confident that the best bid will win and that they should not be put of bidding to host because they fear they will lose simply for not being corrupt enough.

The bribery of foreign officials cannot be fought by international means efficiently if the level of corruption at the national level is high. It depends on the political will of national governments, the activities of civil society and other social conditions that exists inside the state. This explains why in many countries there has been little enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials. [1] In most OECD countries the political will to prosecute major bribery cases is lacking. This explains why international efforts to combat corruption are inefficient.

[1] Transparency International, ‘2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, 22 June 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/4th_oecd_progress_report

Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.

A range of health programs are already available. Many employers offer health insurance and some people deliberately choose to work for such companies for these benefits, even if the pay is a little lower. Other plans can be purchased by individuals with no need to rely on an employer. This means they are free to choose the level of care which is most appropriate to their needs. For other people it can be perfectly reasonable to decide to go without health insurance. Healthy younger adults will on average save money by choosing not to pay high insurance premiums, covering any necessary treatment out of their own pockets from time to time. Why should the state take away all these people’s freedom of choice by imposing a one-size-fits-all socialist system of health care?

Human resources professionals will still be needed to deal with the very many other employment regulations put in place by the federal government. Instead of employees being able to exercise control over their health care choices and work with people in their company, patients will be forced to deal with the nameless, faceless members of the government bureaucracy.

This leads to patients requesting drugs they do not need and in many cases are even harmful to them.

The prescription drugs are very different from freely available drugs. They often treat serious diseases, and so advertising those should target mainly people that are very ill and especially vulnerable. On the other hand, with direct-to-consumer advertising, many people who do not have a serious disease become convinced that they need the prescription drug, because the advertisements scare them.

Because of such advertisement, in the U.S. there was a rapid widespread exposure to dangerous drugs before risks were fully recognized, as with troglitazone (Rezulin) for diabetes and cisapride (Propulsid) for nighttime heartburn. Causing people to become more ill instead of healthier, because this leads to a higher “self-diagnosing”. [1]

[1] Health Information Action, Direct-to-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising The European Commission’s Proposals for Legislative Change, September 2011, http://www.haiweb.org/campaign/DTCA/BMintzes_en.pdf , accessed 08/07/2011

While people do indeed need proper rest and downtime in order to perform to their maximum potential, exactly how much rest they need changes from individual to individual. A "one size fits all" approach through legislation will necessarily mean that some people who could work quite comfortably with no ill effects will be prevented from doing so.

The choice to work or not rightly belongs to them, as does even their decision to risk their health. It might be worth it to someone to take a chance on sleep deprivation in order to earn more pay.

Training is indeed the answer but it makes sense for this to be done on the job rather than simply in lecture theatres. Where there are skills gaps these gaps should be filled by encouraging and paying for temporary jobs to help fill those roles. In this way the young people involved will gain the skills for an area of the economy where there are vacancies.

To tackle gender discrepancies an engendered strategy is required on land, not only housing.

For example, Gulyani and Connors (2002) illustrate the Kalingalinga slum upgrading project in Zambia resulted in negative effects for women. Following investment in slum upgrading the proportion of female-headed households declined with a rise in the proportion of renters and relocations. Slum upgrading raised living costs to women, and without legal land rights female-headed households were forced to relocate and resettle.

There are several reasons why health care should not be considered a universal human right.

The first issue is one of definition – how do we define the services that need to be rendered in order for them to qualify as adequate health care? Where do we draw the line? Emergency surgery, sure, but how about cosmetic surgery?

The second is that all human rights have a clear addressee, an entity that needs to protect this right. But who is targeted here? The government? What if we opt for a private yet universal health coverage – is this any less moral? Let’s forget the institutions for a second, should this moral duty of health care fall solely on the doctors perhaps? [1]

In essence, viewing health care as a right robs us of another, much more essential one – that of the right to one’s own life and one’s livelihood. If it is not considered a service to be rendered, than how could a doctor charge for it? She couldn’t! If it were a right, than each of us would own it, it would have to be inseparable from us. Yet, we don’t and we can’t. [2]

We can see that considering health care as a basic human right has profound philosophical problems, not the least of them the fact that it infringes on the rights of others.

[1] Barlow, P., Health care is not a human right, published 7/31/1999, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1126951/ , accessed 9/18/2011

[2] Sade, R., The Political Fallacy that Medical Care is a Right, published 12/2/1971, http://www.aapsonline.org/brochures/sademcr.htm , accessed 9/18/2011

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Privatising social security would improve economic growth

Privatizing social security would enable investment of savings. Commentator Alex Schibuola argues that: "If Social Security were privatized, people would deposit their income with a bank. People actually save resources that businesses can invest. We, as true savers, get more resources in the future." [1] As a result private accounts would also increase investments, jobs and wages. Michael Tanner of the think tank the Cato Institute argues: "Social Security drains capital from the poorest areas of the country, leaving less money available for new investment and job creation. Privatization would increase national savings and provide a new pool of capital for investment that would be particularly beneficial to the poor." [2]

Currently Social Security represents a net loss for taxpayers and beneficiaries. Social Security, although key to the restructuring the of USA’s social contract following the great depression, represents a bad deal for the post-war American economy. Moreover, this deal has gotten worse over time. 'Baby boomers' are projected to lose roughly 5 cents of every dollar they earn to the OASI program in taxes net of benefits. Young adults who came of age in the early 1990s and today's children are on course to lose over 7 cents of every dollar they earn in net taxes. If OASI taxes were to be raised immediately by the amount needed to pay for OASI benefits on an on-going basis, baby boomers would forfeit 6 cents of every dollar they earn in net OASI taxes. For those born later it would be 10 cents. [3]

Change could be implemented gradually. Andrew Roth argues: “While Americans in retirement or approaching retirement would probably stay in the current system [if Social Security were to be privatized], younger workers should have the option to invest a portion of their money in financial assets other than U.S. Treasuries. These accounts would be the ultimate "lock box" - they would prevent politicians in Washington from raiding the Trust Fund. The truth is that taxpayers bail out politicians every year thanks to Social Security. Congress and the White House spend more money than they have, so they steal money from Social Security to help pay for it. That needs to stop and there is no responsible way of doing that except with personal accounts.” [4] This would make social security much more sustainable as there would no longer be the risk of the money being spent elsewhere.

Put simply, privatizing Social Security would actually boost economic growth and lead to better-protected investments by beneficiaries, benefiting not only themselves but the nation at large. Thus Social Security should be privatized.

[1] Schibuola, Alex. "Time to Privatize? The Economics of Social Security." Open Markets. 16 November 2010. http://www.openmarket.org/2010/11/16/time-to-privatize-the-economics-of-...

[2] Tanner, Michael. "Privatizing Social Security: A Big Boost for the Poor." CATO. 26 July 1996. http://www.socialsecurity.org/pubs/ssps/ssp4.html

[3] Kotlikoff, Lawrence. "Privatizing social security the right way". Testimony to the Committee on Ways and Means. 3 June 3 1998. http://people.bu.edu/kotlikof/Ways&Means.pdf

[4] Roth, Andrew. "Privatize Social Security? Hell Yeah!". Club for Growth.21 September 21 2010. http://www.clubforgrowth.org/perm/ ?

Privatizing Social Security would harm economic growth, not help it. Privatization during the current economic crisis would have been disaster, and so doing it now is a risk for any upcoming or future crisis. Privatization in the midst of the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression would have caused households to have lost even more of their assets, had their investments been invested in the U.S. stock market or in funds exposed to complicated and high risk financial instruments.

Privatizing social security might therefore increase economic growth in the boom times but this would be at the expense of sharper downturns. Proposition’s argument implicitly assumes that the money at the moment does not improve economic growth. On the contrary the government is regularly investing the money in much the same way as private business would – and often on much more long term projects such as infrastructure that fit better with a long term saving than the way that banks invest.

The change need not be dramatic; it need not apply to all oil revenues at once. For example only revenues from new fields could go into the independent fund while existing revenues to the government are maintained. Services therefore won’t need to undergo contraction.

The impact on politics would also be minor; people elect those who get things done not those who blame others for their problems. Moreover all of the politicians will have the same constraint of a lack of funds so no single party will have an unfair advantage.

The bidding process is not too long and does not tie up funds or land that would otherwise be developed. Furthermore, the Olympic bidding process would not be as difficult, expensive or long if the benefits to the eventual victor were not deemed worth all the time and effort. The unsuccessful bids are not wasted, the plans drawn up and experience of the process can be utilized for later bids. Moreover, the exposure granted to land earmarked for Olympic redevelopment can both generate interest in the area and lead to further development in the area regardless of an unsuccessful Olympic bid. The bidding process is now open and trustworthy. Whilst the 1998 Salt Lake City scandal did reveal huge levels of endemic corruption, IOC president Jacques Rogge has taken significant steps to stamp it out. Cities can now be confident that the best bid will win and that they should not be put of bidding to host because they fear they will lose simply for not being corrupt enough.

The bribery of foreign officials cannot be fought by international means efficiently if the level of corruption at the national level is high. It depends on the political will of national governments, the activities of civil society and other social conditions that exists inside the state. This explains why in many countries there has been little enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials. [1] In most OECD countries the political will to prosecute major bribery cases is lacking. This explains why international efforts to combat corruption are inefficient.

[1] Transparency International, ‘2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, 22 June 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/4th_oecd_progress_report

Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.

A range of health programs are already available. Many employers offer health insurance and some people deliberately choose to work for such companies for these benefits, even if the pay is a little lower. Other plans can be purchased by individuals with no need to rely on an employer. This means they are free to choose the level of care which is most appropriate to their needs. For other people it can be perfectly reasonable to decide to go without health insurance. Healthy younger adults will on average save money by choosing not to pay high insurance premiums, covering any necessary treatment out of their own pockets from time to time. Why should the state take away all these people’s freedom of choice by imposing a one-size-fits-all socialist system of health care?

Human resources professionals will still be needed to deal with the very many other employment regulations put in place by the federal government. Instead of employees being able to exercise control over their health care choices and work with people in their company, patients will be forced to deal with the nameless, faceless members of the government bureaucracy.

This leads to patients requesting drugs they do not need and in many cases are even harmful to them.

The prescription drugs are very different from freely available drugs. They often treat serious diseases, and so advertising those should target mainly people that are very ill and especially vulnerable. On the other hand, with direct-to-consumer advertising, many people who do not have a serious disease become convinced that they need the prescription drug, because the advertisements scare them.

Because of such advertisement, in the U.S. there was a rapid widespread exposure to dangerous drugs before risks were fully recognized, as with troglitazone (Rezulin) for diabetes and cisapride (Propulsid) for nighttime heartburn. Causing people to become more ill instead of healthier, because this leads to a higher “self-diagnosing”. [1]

[1] Health Information Action, Direct-to-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising The European Commission’s Proposals for Legislative Change, September 2011, http://www.haiweb.org/campaign/DTCA/BMintzes_en.pdf , accessed 08/07/2011

While people do indeed need proper rest and downtime in order to perform to their maximum potential, exactly how much rest they need changes from individual to individual. A "one size fits all" approach through legislation will necessarily mean that some people who could work quite comfortably with no ill effects will be prevented from doing so.

The choice to work or not rightly belongs to them, as does even their decision to risk their health. It might be worth it to someone to take a chance on sleep deprivation in order to earn more pay.

Training is indeed the answer but it makes sense for this to be done on the job rather than simply in lecture theatres. Where there are skills gaps these gaps should be filled by encouraging and paying for temporary jobs to help fill those roles. In this way the young people involved will gain the skills for an area of the economy where there are vacancies.

To tackle gender discrepancies an engendered strategy is required on land, not only housing.

For example, Gulyani and Connors (2002) illustrate the Kalingalinga slum upgrading project in Zambia resulted in negative effects for women. Following investment in slum upgrading the proportion of female-headed households declined with a rise in the proportion of renters and relocations. Slum upgrading raised living costs to women, and without legal land rights female-headed households were forced to relocate and resettle.

There are several reasons why health care should not be considered a universal human right.

The first issue is one of definition – how do we define the services that need to be rendered in order for them to qualify as adequate health care? Where do we draw the line? Emergency surgery, sure, but how about cosmetic surgery?

The second is that all human rights have a clear addressee, an entity that needs to protect this right. But who is targeted here? The government? What if we opt for a private yet universal health coverage – is this any less moral? Let’s forget the institutions for a second, should this moral duty of health care fall solely on the doctors perhaps? [1]

In essence, viewing health care as a right robs us of another, much more essential one – that of the right to one’s own life and one’s livelihood. If it is not considered a service to be rendered, than how could a doctor charge for it? She couldn’t! If it were a right, than each of us would own it, it would have to be inseparable from us. Yet, we don’t and we can’t. [2]

We can see that considering health care as a basic human right has profound philosophical problems, not the least of them the fact that it infringes on the rights of others.

[1] Barlow, P., Health care is not a human right, published 7/31/1999, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1126951/ , accessed 9/18/2011

[2] Sade, R., The Political Fallacy that Medical Care is a Right, published 12/2/1971, http://www.aapsonline.org/brochures/sademcr.htm , accessed 9/18/2011

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim


Question:
Privatising the social security system would harm economic growth

Creating private accounts could have an impact on economic growth, which in turn would hit social security's future finances. Economic growth could be hit as privatizing Social Security will increase federal deficits and as a result debt significantly, while increasing the likelihood that national savings will decline which will happen as baby boomers retire anyway and draw down their savings.

An analysis by the Centre on Budget and Policy Priorities shows that the proposed privatization by Obama would add $1 trillion in new federal debt in its first decade of implementation, and a further $3.5 trillion in the following decade. [1] Because households change their saving and spending levels in response to economic conditions privatization is actually more likely to reduce than increase national savings. This is because households that consider the new accounts to constitute meaningful increases in their retirement wealth might well reduce their other saving. Diamond and Orszag argue, 'If anything, our impression is that diverting a portion of the current Social Security surplus into individual accounts could reduce national saving.' That, in turn, would further weaken economic growth and our capacity to pay for the retirement of the baby boomers." [2]

The deficit, and as a result national debt, would increase because trillions of dollars which had previously been paying for current retirees would be taken out of the system to be invested privately. Those who are already retired will however still need to draw a pension so the government would need to borrow the money to be able to pay for these pensions. [3]

Contrary to side proposition’s assertions, privatization also would not increase capital available for investment. Proponents of privatization claim that the flow of dollars into private accounts and then into the equity markets will stimulate the economy. However, as the social security system underwent the transition into private ownership, each dollar invested in a financial instrument via the proprietary freedoms afforded to account holders, would result in the government borrowing a dollar to cover pay outs to those currently drawing from the social security system.

Thus, the supposed benefit of a privatised social security system is entirely eliminated by increased government borrowing, as the net impact on the capital available for investment is zero. [4]

While four fifths of tax dollars for social security is spent immediately the final fifth purchases Treasury securities through trust funds. Privatization would hasten depletion of these funds. President Bush proposed diverting up to 4 percentage points of payroll tax to create the private accounts but with payroll currently 12.4% this would still be significantly more than the one fifth that is currently left over so depleting reserves. Funds now being set aside to build up the Trust Funds to provide for retiring baby boomers would be being used instead to pay for the privatization accounts. The Trust Funds would be exhausted much sooner than the thirty-eight to forty-eight years projected if nothing is done. In such a short time frame, the investments in the personal accounts will not be nearly large enough to provide an adequate cushion. [5]

[1] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. "Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf

[2] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. "Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf

[3] Spitzer, Elliot. "Can we finally kill this terrible idea?" Slate. 4 February 2009. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_best_policy/2009/02/privatize_social_security.html

[4] Spitzer, Elliot. "Can we finally kill this terrible idea?" Slate. 4 February 2009. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_best_policy/2009/02/privatize_social_security.html

[5] Anrig, Greg and Wasow, Bernard. "Twelve reasons why privatizing social security is a bad idea". The Century Foundation. 14 February 2005. http://tcf.org/media-center/pdfs/pr46/12badideas.pdf

Privatization would increase national savings and provide a new pool of capital for investment that would be particularly beneficial to the poor. As it stands, Social Security is a net loss maker for the American taxpayer, and this situation will only continue to get worse unless privatization is enacted: those born after the baby boom will forfeit 10 cents of every dollar they earn in payments towards the up keep of the Social Security system.

By contrast, under privatization people would actually save resources that businesses can invest. As Alan Greenspan has pointed out, the economic benefits of privatization of Social Security are potentially enormous. In Chile, as Dr. Piñera has noted, there has been real economic growth of 7 percent a year over the past decade, energized by a savings rate in excess of 20 percent. [1]

Martin Feldstein, a Harvard economist, formerly Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors under President Reagan, estimated that the present value to the U.S. economy of investing the future cash flow of payroll taxes in real assets would be on the order of $10 to $20 trillion. That would mean a permanent, significant boost to economic growth. [2]

[1] Crane, Edward. "The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System." CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html

[2] Crane, Edward. "The Case for Privatizing America's Social Security System." CATO Institute. 10 December 1997. http://www.cato.org/testimony/art-22.html

The change need not be dramatic; it need not apply to all oil revenues at once. For example only revenues from new fields could go into the independent fund while existing revenues to the government are maintained. Services therefore won’t need to undergo contraction.

The impact on politics would also be minor; people elect those who get things done not those who blame others for their problems. Moreover all of the politicians will have the same constraint of a lack of funds so no single party will have an unfair advantage.

The bidding process is not too long and does not tie up funds or land that would otherwise be developed. Furthermore, the Olympic bidding process would not be as difficult, expensive or long if the benefits to the eventual victor were not deemed worth all the time and effort. The unsuccessful bids are not wasted, the plans drawn up and experience of the process can be utilized for later bids. Moreover, the exposure granted to land earmarked for Olympic redevelopment can both generate interest in the area and lead to further development in the area regardless of an unsuccessful Olympic bid. The bidding process is now open and trustworthy. Whilst the 1998 Salt Lake City scandal did reveal huge levels of endemic corruption, IOC president Jacques Rogge has taken significant steps to stamp it out. Cities can now be confident that the best bid will win and that they should not be put of bidding to host because they fear they will lose simply for not being corrupt enough.

The bribery of foreign officials cannot be fought by international means efficiently if the level of corruption at the national level is high. It depends on the political will of national governments, the activities of civil society and other social conditions that exists inside the state. This explains why in many countries there has been little enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials. [1] In most OECD countries the political will to prosecute major bribery cases is lacking. This explains why international efforts to combat corruption are inefficient.

[1] Transparency International, ‘2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions’, 22 June 2008, http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/2008/4th_oecd_progress_report

Businesses are concerned with their bottom line. They will pay workers as little as possible in order to maximize profits. Certainly in some businesses employers require highly skilled workers for which they will be willing to pay competitive wages. However, the people who most require worker protection, those on minimum wage, are generally unskilled and interchangeable with a large body of potential employees. For this reason there is little impetus to pay workers at the lowest echelons of firms anything but the lowest possible wages. Even if some firms are willing to offer comparatively higher wages to entice honest and diligent non-skilled workers, the overall wage schedule will be depressed as far as is economically possible.

A range of health programs are already available. Many employers offer health insurance and some people deliberately choose to work for such companies for these benefits, even if the pay is a little lower. Other plans can be purchased by individuals with no need to rely on an employer. This means they are free to choose the level of care which is most appropriate to their needs. For other people it can be perfectly reasonable to decide to go without health insurance. Healthy younger adults will on average save money by choosing not to pay high insurance premiums, covering any necessary treatment out of their own pockets from time to time. Why should the state take away all these people’s freedom of choice by imposing a one-size-fits-all socialist system of health care?

Human resources professionals will still be needed to deal with the very many other employment regulations put in place by the federal government. Instead of employees being able to exercise control over their health care choices and work with people in their company, patients will be forced to deal with the nameless, faceless members of the government bureaucracy.

This leads to patients requesting drugs they do not need and in many cases are even harmful to them.

The prescription drugs are very different from freely available drugs. They often treat serious diseases, and so advertising those should target mainly people that are very ill and especially vulnerable. On the other hand, with direct-to-consumer advertising, many people who do not have a serious disease become convinced that they need the prescription drug, because the advertisements scare them.

Because of such advertisement, in the U.S. there was a rapid widespread exposure to dangerous drugs before risks were fully recognized, as with troglitazone (Rezulin) for diabetes and cisapride (Propulsid) for nighttime heartburn. Causing people to become more ill instead of healthier, because this leads to a higher “self-diagnosing”. [1]

[1] Health Information Action, Direct-to-Consumer Prescription Drug Advertising The European Commission’s Proposals for Legislative Change, September 2011, http://www.haiweb.org/campaign/DTCA/BMintzes_en.pdf , accessed 08/07/2011

While people do indeed need proper rest and downtime in order to perform to their maximum potential, exactly how much rest they need changes from individual to individual. A "one size fits all" approach through legislation will necessarily mean that some people who could work quite comfortably with no ill effects will be prevented from doing so.

The choice to work or not rightly belongs to them, as does even their decision to risk their health. It might be worth it to someone to take a chance on sleep deprivation in order to earn more pay.

Training is indeed the answer but it makes sense for this to be done on the job rather than simply in lecture theatres. Where there are skills gaps these gaps should be filled by encouraging and paying for temporary jobs to help fill those roles. In this way the young people involved will gain the skills for an area of the economy where there are vacancies.

To tackle gender discrepancies an engendered strategy is required on land, not only housing.

For example, Gulyani and Connors (2002) illustrate the Kalingalinga slum upgrading project in Zambia resulted in negative effects for women. Following investment in slum upgrading the proportion of female-headed households declined with a rise in the proportion of renters and relocations. Slum upgrading raised living costs to women, and without legal land rights female-headed households were forced to relocate and resettle.

There are several reasons why health care should not be considered a universal human right.

The first issue is one of definition – how do we define the services that need to be rendered in order for them to qualify as adequate health care? Where do we draw the line? Emergency surgery, sure, but how about cosmetic surgery?

The second is that all human rights have a clear addressee, an entity that needs to protect this right. But who is targeted here? The government? What if we opt for a private yet universal health coverage – is this any less moral? Let’s forget the institutions for a second, should this moral duty of health care fall solely on the doctors perhaps? [1]

In essence, viewing health care as a right robs us of another, much more essential one – that of the right to one’s own life and one’s livelihood. If it is not considered a service to be rendered, than how could a doctor charge for it? She couldn’t! If it were a right, than each of us would own it, it would have to be inseparable from us. Yet, we don’t and we can’t. [2]

We can see that considering health care as a basic human right has profound philosophical problems, not the least of them the fact that it infringes on the rights of others.

[1] Barlow, P., Health care is not a human right, published 7/31/1999, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1126951/ , accessed 9/18/2011

[2] Sade, R., The Political Fallacy that Medical Care is a Right, published 12/2/1971, http://www.aapsonline.org/brochures/sademcr.htm , accessed 9/18/2011

Instruction: Given a claim, retrieve documents that refute the claim