A Nation of Takers


Book Description

In A Nation of Takers: America’s Entitlement Epidemic, one of our country’s foremost demographers, Nicholas Eberstadt, details the exponential growth in entitlement spending over the past fifty years. As he notes, in 1960, entitlement payments accounted for well under a third of the federal government’s total outlays. Today, entitlement spending accounts for a full two-thirds of the federal budget. Drawing on an impressive array of data and employing a range of easy- to- read, four color charts, Eberstadt shows the unchecked spiral of spending on a range of entitlements, everything from medicare to disability payments. But Eberstadt does not just chart the astonishing growth of entitlement spending, he also details the enormous economic and cultural costs of this epidemic. He powerfully argues that while this spending certainly drains our federal coffers, it also has a very real,long-lasting, negative impact on the character of our citizens. Also included in the book is a response from one of our leading political theorists, William Galston. In his incisive response, he questions Eberstadt’s conclusions about the corrosive effect of entitlements on character and offers his own analysis of the impact of American entitlement growth.




Brookings Papers on Economic Activity: Spring 2017


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Brookings Papers on Economic Activity (BPEA) provides academic and business economists, government officials, and members of the financial and business communities with timely research on current economic issues.







Oregon Blue Book


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Disentitlement?


Book Description

No developed nation relies exclusively on the private sector to finance health care for citizens. This book begins by exploring the deficiencies in private health insurance that account for this. It then recounts the history and examines the legal character of America's public health care entitlements - Medicare, Medicaid, and tax subsidies for employment-related health benefits. These programs are increasingly embattled, attacked by those advocating privatization (replacing public with private insurance); individualization (replacing group and community-based insurance with approaches based on individual choice within markets); and devolution (devolving authority over entitlements to state governments and to private entities). Jost critically analyzes this movement toward disentitlement. He also examines the primary models for structuring health care entitlements in other countries - general taxation-funded national health insurance and social insurance - and considers what we can learn from these models. The book concludes by describing what an American entitlement-based health care system could look like, and in particular how the legal characteristics of our entitlement programs could be structured to support the long-term sustainability of these vital programs.




Entitlement Spending


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Budget Process Law Annotated


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The Guide to the Federal Budget


Book Description

Rowman & Littlefield is proud to publish the 17th edition of what is now considered to be the most useful reference book available on the federal budget. In The Guide to the Federal Budget, Fiscal 1998, Stanley E. Collender, among a handful of people who have worked for both the House and Senate budget committees, analyzes the extensive debates surrounding the fiscal 1997 budget and explains in detail such 1998 budget challenges as the line item veto, entitlement spending, and the persistent politics of divided government. An indispensable guide for policy analysts, The Guide to the Federal Government, Fiscal 1998 is written at a level accessible to general readers and includes illuminating appendices, a revised and updated glossary of key terms, and a thorough index. With a concluding chapter entitled "How to Read and Use the Federal Budget," and a new chapter on the line item veto, this book will be particularly useful for courses in Budget Politics and Analysis and Public Policy.




The Deficit Myth


Book Description

A New York Times Bestseller The leading thinker and most visible public advocate of modern monetary theory -- the freshest and most important idea about economics in decades -- delivers a radically different, bold, new understanding for how to build a just and prosperous society. Stephanie Kelton's brilliant exploration of modern monetary theory (MMT) dramatically changes our understanding of how we can best deal with crucial issues ranging from poverty and inequality to creating jobs, expanding health care coverage, climate change, and building resilient infrastructure. Any ambitious proposal, however, inevitably runs into the buzz saw of how to find the money to pay for it, rooted in myths about deficits that are hobbling us as a country. Kelton busts through the myths that prevent us from taking action: that the federal government should budget like a household, that deficits will harm the next generation, crowd out private investment, and undermine long-term growth, and that entitlements are propelling us toward a grave fiscal crisis. MMT, as Kelton shows, shifts the terrain from narrow budgetary questions to one of broader economic and social benefits. With its important new ways of understanding money, taxes, and the critical role of deficit spending, MMT redefines how to responsibly use our resources so that we can maximize our potential as a society. MMT gives us the power to imagine a new politics and a new economy and move from a narrative of scarcity to one of opportunity.