Words & Numbers
About this podcast
Insightful weekly commentary on news & current events from economist Antony Davies and political scientist James R. Harrigan.
Join the conversation
The CBO Is Almost, but Not Quite, Useless
December 6, 2017
Economist Paul Krugman is well-known for his pro-Democrat stances. Recently, he's claimed that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has said that if the Individual Mandate portion of the Affordable Care Act, often called Obamacare, is repealed, 22 million Americans will "lose" their health insurance. What he doesn't say is that the vast majority of those 22 million people are simply opting out. They are _choosing_ not to have health insurance. But here's the problem with CBO forecasts: they're usually wrong. And they're wrong in almost the exact same way. Why are the CBO forecasts so bad? Why do they consistently get it wrong in such a consistent way? And what does this mean for our economy? James Harrigan and Antony Davies discuss this and more in this week's episode of Words and Numbers.
Show Notes
- Emirates’ new 777
- Curing disease by rewriting our DNA
- iHeart Radio
- Jeff Sessions on marijuana-01
- Jeff Sessions on marijuana-02
- Jeff Sessions on marijuana-03
- Foolishness of the week
- The CBO
- Follow us on Twitter-01
- Follow us on Twitter-02
- Join the Words and Numbers Backstage FB group, where the conversation continues