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Beat the Press is Dean Baker's commentary on economic reporting. He is a Senior Economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR). To never miss a post, subscribe to a weekly email roundup of Beat the Press. Please also consider supporting the blog on Patreon.

The supporters of Larry Summers drive to be Fed chair are desperately trying to rewrite history so that this world class champion of financial deregulation was actually a prescient supporter of tighter regulation all along. Exhibit A in this historical rewriting is a report on predatory lending that the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the Treasury Department put out in 2000, when Summers was Treasury Secretary. The report is featured as an example of Summers’ commitment to regulation in a NYT article comparing Larry Summers’ and Janet Yellen’s record on regulation.

The report contains many sound recommendations about requiring lenders to better disclose terms of loans, limiting loan flipping, and sharply restricting the use of prepayment penalties. The article tells readers:

“The report recommended modest changes in federal law but Congress, then controlled by Republicans, made none. The Fed and other banking regulators also ignored the findings.”

If readers are unfamiliar with this history of Larry Summers as a crusader for regulations protecting consumers, they can be forgiven. Summers was apparently unable to get even a single mention for this report in the New York Times in the month it was issued. Furthermore, it is inaccurate to imply that the report was a major departure from views held at the time by all Republicans or even Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan.

A NYT article from April 2, 2000 began by telling readers:

“After several years of inaction, pressure is building in Washington to impose tighter rules on banks and finance companies that specialize in lending money to homeowners with blemished credit records.

“Representative Jim Leach, the Iowa Republican who is chairman of the House Banking Committee, said last week that his committee would be pressing for more vigorous enforcement of a law adopted in 1994 to combat deceptive lending practices, and may do more.”

Later the piece added:

“all four federal banking regulators — including Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve — had spoken out against deceptive lending practices, and some are beginning to develop new regulations.”

The piece then goes on to cite comments from Franklin Raines, then the CEO of Fannie Mae, about cutting off access to funds to abusive lenders. It then tells readers;

“Wall Street, where Fannie Mae is a formidable voice, is also sensitive to the views of Mr. Greenspan. And he, too, recently condemned predatory lending practices.

“‘Although markets have ‘vastly expanded credit to virtually all income classes,’ Mr. Greenspan said in a speech on March 22, he was concerned about ‘abusive lending practices that target specific neighborhoods or vulnerable segments of the population.’

“The Fed has formed a multiagency study group to explore ways to address predatory lending, aides to Mr. Greenspan said.”

In short the report that the Treasury Department co-authored with HUD under Summers leadership was largely repeating warnings that even the arch-deregulators were also making at the same time. He apparently did not view the issue as important enough to draw even minimal press attention to the report. 

The article also notes Summers’ role in stifling Brooksley Born’s effort to regulate derivatives as head of the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission. It reports the defense of Summers’ allies:

“But he and his supporters have maintained that the failure occurred because the use of derivatives changed over a decade in ways that they did not anticipate.”

Actually, the idea that derivatives could pose a threat to financial stability should not have been a surprise to sentient beings even in the late 1990s. Alan Greenspan said that he felt it was necessary for the Fed to intervene in the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management in September of 1998 in order to preserve the stability of financial markets. Long-Term Capital had been heavily involved in derivative markets at the time, which should have provided some hint as to ability to create instability for the financial system.

 

Correction:

The report was actually released in June of 2000, not April. Its release did get an unattributed 6 paragraph story in the New York Times, with no mention of Summers.

 

The supporters of Larry Summers drive to be Fed chair are desperately trying to rewrite history so that this world class champion of financial deregulation was actually a prescient supporter of tighter regulation all along. Exhibit A in this historical rewriting is a report on predatory lending that the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the Treasury Department put out in 2000, when Summers was Treasury Secretary. The report is featured as an example of Summers’ commitment to regulation in a NYT article comparing Larry Summers’ and Janet Yellen’s record on regulation.

The report contains many sound recommendations about requiring lenders to better disclose terms of loans, limiting loan flipping, and sharply restricting the use of prepayment penalties. The article tells readers:

“The report recommended modest changes in federal law but Congress, then controlled by Republicans, made none. The Fed and other banking regulators also ignored the findings.”

If readers are unfamiliar with this history of Larry Summers as a crusader for regulations protecting consumers, they can be forgiven. Summers was apparently unable to get even a single mention for this report in the New York Times in the month it was issued. Furthermore, it is inaccurate to imply that the report was a major departure from views held at the time by all Republicans or even Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan.

A NYT article from April 2, 2000 began by telling readers:

“After several years of inaction, pressure is building in Washington to impose tighter rules on banks and finance companies that specialize in lending money to homeowners with blemished credit records.

“Representative Jim Leach, the Iowa Republican who is chairman of the House Banking Committee, said last week that his committee would be pressing for more vigorous enforcement of a law adopted in 1994 to combat deceptive lending practices, and may do more.”

Later the piece added:

“all four federal banking regulators — including Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve — had spoken out against deceptive lending practices, and some are beginning to develop new regulations.”

The piece then goes on to cite comments from Franklin Raines, then the CEO of Fannie Mae, about cutting off access to funds to abusive lenders. It then tells readers;

“Wall Street, where Fannie Mae is a formidable voice, is also sensitive to the views of Mr. Greenspan. And he, too, recently condemned predatory lending practices.

“‘Although markets have ‘vastly expanded credit to virtually all income classes,’ Mr. Greenspan said in a speech on March 22, he was concerned about ‘abusive lending practices that target specific neighborhoods or vulnerable segments of the population.’

“The Fed has formed a multiagency study group to explore ways to address predatory lending, aides to Mr. Greenspan said.”

In short the report that the Treasury Department co-authored with HUD under Summers leadership was largely repeating warnings that even the arch-deregulators were also making at the same time. He apparently did not view the issue as important enough to draw even minimal press attention to the report. 

The article also notes Summers’ role in stifling Brooksley Born’s effort to regulate derivatives as head of the Commodities and Futures Trading Commission. It reports the defense of Summers’ allies:

“But he and his supporters have maintained that the failure occurred because the use of derivatives changed over a decade in ways that they did not anticipate.”

Actually, the idea that derivatives could pose a threat to financial stability should not have been a surprise to sentient beings even in the late 1990s. Alan Greenspan said that he felt it was necessary for the Fed to intervene in the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management in September of 1998 in order to preserve the stability of financial markets. Long-Term Capital had been heavily involved in derivative markets at the time, which should have provided some hint as to ability to create instability for the financial system.

 

Correction:

The report was actually released in June of 2000, not April. Its release did get an unattributed 6 paragraph story in the New York Times, with no mention of Summers.

 

Things are getting hot and heavy as the battle for Fed succession moves into the second half. Earlier this week, the Washington Post’s Fed reporter, Neil Irwin, decided to go head to head with Bette Midler over some unflattering tweets about Larry Summers and his prospects for becoming Fed chair. As a public service, Beat the Press is refereeing the exchange.

Ms Midler led off with the tweet:

“HUH. The architect of bank deregulation, which turned straitlaced banks into casinos and bankers into pimps, may be next Head Fed: Summers.”

Irwin took issue with this by pointing out that the Clinton administration, as well as the Bush administration, were filled with proponents of deregulation. This would be people like Robert Rubin, Alan Greenspan and Timothy Geithner. Based on this background Irwin doesn’t think it’s fair to call Summers “the architect of bank deregulation.” 

We at Beat the Press have to call this one mostly for Midler. After all, Summers is known to be a forceful character, not just a shrinking violet who sits in the corner of the room. Regulation fans everywhere remember how Summers denounced Raghuram Rajan as a financial luddite for raising the possibility that deregulation might lead to instability in the financial system at the Fed’s big Greenspanfest in 2005.

Summers was a big actor in pushing the deregulation agenda. He deserves credit for his work. If we change Midler’s tweet to read, “an architect of bank deregulation,” she is 100 percent on the mark.

Next Midler tweeted:

“Larry Summers, Mr. De-Regulation, has never stepped forward to say…”Oops! My bad!” Five years of a world wide recession, and not a peep.”

Irwin doesn’t dispute this one: no apologies from from Summers. We’ll call that a draw.

Then we have Midler tweeting:

“Larry Summers, a HUGE ADVOCATE of higher exec pay and bonuses for execs whose firms received billions in federal bailouts during the crisis.”

Irwin takes serious issue with this one. He assumes that this refers to the scandal around the hundreds of millions paid out in AIG bonuses even as the company was being kept on life support by the taxpayers.  Irwin clearly takes Summers’ side here:

“In the wake of outcry over bonuses to AIG employees, for example, Summers said that the admnistration was trying to stop the bonuses but legally couldn’t. ‘Secretary Geithner courageously has gone after these bonuses and will continue to go after these bonuses in a very aggressive way, but we can’t suspend the rule of law and we can’t put the whole economy at risk,’ Summers said in a CNN interview. ‘It is wrong to govern out of anger . . .  we can’t let anger stop us from taking the steps that are necessary to maintain the stability of the financial system, keep credit flowing.’ Not quite the same as being a huge advocate.”

We’re not buying Irwin’s line here. First it is not clear that this is Midler’s point of reference. Summers was an advocate of the no questions asked bailout from day one, lobbying the Democratic caucus in September of 2008 to approve the TARP. At that moment, the market was passing judgement on the banks and prepared to send them to the dustbin of history.

If there was to be a bailout Congress could have imposed any terms it liked. Instead, Summers insisted that Congress just give up the money with no real conditions, otherwise we would have a second Great Depression. (Sorry, this is nonsense. The first Great Depression was not caused by a financial crisis alone at its start, but rather a decade of inadequate response. Summers surely knows this.)

Even in the AIG case it is not clear the government could not have forced the bonuses to be taken back. It controlled the flow of money to the company, which it could have ended at any time. Faced with its literal demise, it is likely that the top execs at AIG could have forced substantial reductions in bonuses across the board.

It’s striking that Summers was so concerned about the “rule of law” in this case but seems to show little evidence of concern for the rule of law when it comes to pensions for workers in places like Detroit and Chicago. One could reasonably conclude from his behavior in this and other instances that Summers thinks that high CEO pay and bonuses, even at bailed out companies, is just fine. Beat the Press calls this one for Midler.

So there you have it, Midler wins 2-0-1.

 

Addendum:

It’s possible that in calling Summers a huge advocate of higher exec pay, Midler was referring to the accounts reported in Ron Suskind’s book, Confidence Men: Wall Street, Washington, and the Education of a President. In this book, Suskind reports accounts of Summers discussing the market as a tool that exposes natural inequality. In other words, he believed that the large gaps in income that we see reflect differences in intelligence and skills.

That is certainly a plausible reference for Midler’s tweet and would provide another reason to score the exchange for Midler.

 

Things are getting hot and heavy as the battle for Fed succession moves into the second half. Earlier this week, the Washington Post’s Fed reporter, Neil Irwin, decided to go head to head with Bette Midler over some unflattering tweets about Larry Summers and his prospects for becoming Fed chair. As a public service, Beat the Press is refereeing the exchange.

Ms Midler led off with the tweet:

“HUH. The architect of bank deregulation, which turned straitlaced banks into casinos and bankers into pimps, may be next Head Fed: Summers.”

Irwin took issue with this by pointing out that the Clinton administration, as well as the Bush administration, were filled with proponents of deregulation. This would be people like Robert Rubin, Alan Greenspan and Timothy Geithner. Based on this background Irwin doesn’t think it’s fair to call Summers “the architect of bank deregulation.” 

We at Beat the Press have to call this one mostly for Midler. After all, Summers is known to be a forceful character, not just a shrinking violet who sits in the corner of the room. Regulation fans everywhere remember how Summers denounced Raghuram Rajan as a financial luddite for raising the possibility that deregulation might lead to instability in the financial system at the Fed’s big Greenspanfest in 2005.

Summers was a big actor in pushing the deregulation agenda. He deserves credit for his work. If we change Midler’s tweet to read, “an architect of bank deregulation,” she is 100 percent on the mark.

Next Midler tweeted:

“Larry Summers, Mr. De-Regulation, has never stepped forward to say…”Oops! My bad!” Five years of a world wide recession, and not a peep.”

Irwin doesn’t dispute this one: no apologies from from Summers. We’ll call that a draw.

Then we have Midler tweeting:

“Larry Summers, a HUGE ADVOCATE of higher exec pay and bonuses for execs whose firms received billions in federal bailouts during the crisis.”

Irwin takes serious issue with this one. He assumes that this refers to the scandal around the hundreds of millions paid out in AIG bonuses even as the company was being kept on life support by the taxpayers.  Irwin clearly takes Summers’ side here:

“In the wake of outcry over bonuses to AIG employees, for example, Summers said that the admnistration was trying to stop the bonuses but legally couldn’t. ‘Secretary Geithner courageously has gone after these bonuses and will continue to go after these bonuses in a very aggressive way, but we can’t suspend the rule of law and we can’t put the whole economy at risk,’ Summers said in a CNN interview. ‘It is wrong to govern out of anger . . .  we can’t let anger stop us from taking the steps that are necessary to maintain the stability of the financial system, keep credit flowing.’ Not quite the same as being a huge advocate.”

We’re not buying Irwin’s line here. First it is not clear that this is Midler’s point of reference. Summers was an advocate of the no questions asked bailout from day one, lobbying the Democratic caucus in September of 2008 to approve the TARP. At that moment, the market was passing judgement on the banks and prepared to send them to the dustbin of history.

If there was to be a bailout Congress could have imposed any terms it liked. Instead, Summers insisted that Congress just give up the money with no real conditions, otherwise we would have a second Great Depression. (Sorry, this is nonsense. The first Great Depression was not caused by a financial crisis alone at its start, but rather a decade of inadequate response. Summers surely knows this.)

Even in the AIG case it is not clear the government could not have forced the bonuses to be taken back. It controlled the flow of money to the company, which it could have ended at any time. Faced with its literal demise, it is likely that the top execs at AIG could have forced substantial reductions in bonuses across the board.

It’s striking that Summers was so concerned about the “rule of law” in this case but seems to show little evidence of concern for the rule of law when it comes to pensions for workers in places like Detroit and Chicago. One could reasonably conclude from his behavior in this and other instances that Summers thinks that high CEO pay and bonuses, even at bailed out companies, is just fine. Beat the Press calls this one for Midler.

So there you have it, Midler wins 2-0-1.

 

Addendum:

It’s possible that in calling Summers a huge advocate of higher exec pay, Midler was referring to the accounts reported in Ron Suskind’s book, Confidence Men: Wall Street, Washington, and the Education of a President. In this book, Suskind reports accounts of Summers discussing the market as a tool that exposes natural inequality. In other words, he believed that the large gaps in income that we see reflect differences in intelligence and skills.

That is certainly a plausible reference for Midler’s tweet and would provide another reason to score the exchange for Midler.

 

The Post had a somewhat confused editorial about the imposition of tariffs on solar panels made in China. The argument for the tariffs is that China subsidizes its panels leading to unfair competition. As the editorial correctly notes, the determination of whether the panels are subsidized is not easy. (Panels sell for less than average cost, but well above marginal cost.)

However the editorial notes a counter-tariff imposed on a key material input imposed by China and then tells readers:

“Tariffs on both sides, meanwhile, promise to push up the price of solar equipment in the United States.”

Of course raising the price of solar equipment in the United States was the goal of the U.S. tariff, not an unexpected outcome as the Post seems to imply. The real questions on the tariff is what the long-run picture for the industry will look like if China continues its current policy unchecked. (Do we think they will get a near-monopoly and then jack up prices?) And second, are protective measures worth the cost of slowing the spread of solar energy, even if it might lead to a somewhat stronger domestic industry? These basic issues do not appear in the Post’s editorial.

The Post had a somewhat confused editorial about the imposition of tariffs on solar panels made in China. The argument for the tariffs is that China subsidizes its panels leading to unfair competition. As the editorial correctly notes, the determination of whether the panels are subsidized is not easy. (Panels sell for less than average cost, but well above marginal cost.)

However the editorial notes a counter-tariff imposed on a key material input imposed by China and then tells readers:

“Tariffs on both sides, meanwhile, promise to push up the price of solar equipment in the United States.”

Of course raising the price of solar equipment in the United States was the goal of the U.S. tariff, not an unexpected outcome as the Post seems to imply. The real questions on the tariff is what the long-run picture for the industry will look like if China continues its current policy unchecked. (Do we think they will get a near-monopoly and then jack up prices?) And second, are protective measures worth the cost of slowing the spread of solar energy, even if it might lead to a somewhat stronger domestic industry? These basic issues do not appear in the Post’s editorial.

The Post has a lengthy piece reporting on how the austerity policies being imposed on Spain by the European Central Bank are ruining the lives of its people.

The Post has a lengthy piece reporting on how the austerity policies being imposed on Spain by the European Central Bank are ruining the lives of its people.

More Which Way Is Up Problems

An Associated Press article in the NYT told readers about Japan’s “sluggish” growth in the second quarter. The article told readers that Japan’s economy grew at a 2.6 percent annual rate in the quarter.

The problem is that the media generally touted the 1.7 percent annual growth in the U.S. in the second quarter as a being positive news. It’s difficult to see how a 2.6 percent growth rate in Japan can be seen as sluggish while a 1.7 percent growth rate in the United States is healthy, especially since Japan has a declining population and labor force, while ours is growing at roughly a 0.7 percent annual rate.

An Associated Press article in the NYT told readers about Japan’s “sluggish” growth in the second quarter. The article told readers that Japan’s economy grew at a 2.6 percent annual rate in the quarter.

The problem is that the media generally touted the 1.7 percent annual growth in the U.S. in the second quarter as a being positive news. It’s difficult to see how a 2.6 percent growth rate in Japan can be seen as sluggish while a 1.7 percent growth rate in the United States is healthy, especially since Japan has a declining population and labor force, while ours is growing at roughly a 0.7 percent annual rate.

The NYT had an excellent piece on how a variety of arcane restrictions make it difficult for even well-trained foreign physicians to practice medicine in the United States. These restrictions are kept in place at the insistence of the doctors’ lobbies since they allow them to sustain their high wages. This is a great example of how Washington is dominated by protectionists who are intent on using trade barriers to protect special interests even though it poses enormous costs on patients and the economy.

It is worth noting that one of the issues raised in the piece, the potential drain of educated workers from the developing world, could be easily remedied. Since doctors must be licensed to practice, it would be a simple matter to impose a modest tax on the income of foreign trained physicians (e.g. 10 percent). This tax could then be repatriated to the home country so that it could train two or three physicians for everyone that came to the United States. This one is so simple that even an economist could figure it out. In this way, the sending country would benefit as well from the decision of their doctors to immigrate to the United States.

The NYT had an excellent piece on how a variety of arcane restrictions make it difficult for even well-trained foreign physicians to practice medicine in the United States. These restrictions are kept in place at the insistence of the doctors’ lobbies since they allow them to sustain their high wages. This is a great example of how Washington is dominated by protectionists who are intent on using trade barriers to protect special interests even though it poses enormous costs on patients and the economy.

It is worth noting that one of the issues raised in the piece, the potential drain of educated workers from the developing world, could be easily remedied. Since doctors must be licensed to practice, it would be a simple matter to impose a modest tax on the income of foreign trained physicians (e.g. 10 percent). This tax could then be repatriated to the home country so that it could train two or three physicians for everyone that came to the United States. This one is so simple that even an economist could figure it out. In this way, the sending country would benefit as well from the decision of their doctors to immigrate to the United States.

Glenn Hubbard, along with Tim Kane, had a column in the NYT today decrying the budget deficit. The column begins by repeating the warnings of that well known economic expert, Admiral Mike Mullen, that the debt is the “single biggest threat to our national security.” There is more than a bit of irony in Hubbard writing this sort of piece. Hubbard was the chief economic advisor to President George W. Bush when he pushed through his tax cuts in 2001. The tax cuts, along with the recession and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, pushed the budget from a surplus of 2.5 percent of GDP in 2000, to deficits of more than 3.5 percent of GDP in 2003 and 2004. While running large deficits was the right move for the economy in response to the recession created by the collapse of the stock bubble (although there were far better uses for the money than tax cuts to rich people and fighting unnecessary wars), there is more than a bit of inconsistency in Hubbard's apparent willingness to use deficits to boost the economy out of a recession in the last decade while at the same time disparaging President Obama's efforts to use deficits to lift the economy out of a far deeper hole. The double standard in this piece is explicit. It tells readers: "When Reagan was sworn into office, gross federal debt equaled 32.5 percent of G.D.P. Under President Obama’s leadership, it has risen above 100 percent." Readers may not have realized that the debt to GDP ratio had been a consistent downward path from the end of World War II, when it was over 110 percent of GDP, until President Reagan took office. It then began to rise quickly in the 1980s and early 1990s, reaching more than 70 percent of GDP when the first President Bush left office in early 1993. (This is the total debt, which includes the bonds held by Social Security and other government trust funds.)
Glenn Hubbard, along with Tim Kane, had a column in the NYT today decrying the budget deficit. The column begins by repeating the warnings of that well known economic expert, Admiral Mike Mullen, that the debt is the “single biggest threat to our national security.” There is more than a bit of irony in Hubbard writing this sort of piece. Hubbard was the chief economic advisor to President George W. Bush when he pushed through his tax cuts in 2001. The tax cuts, along with the recession and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, pushed the budget from a surplus of 2.5 percent of GDP in 2000, to deficits of more than 3.5 percent of GDP in 2003 and 2004. While running large deficits was the right move for the economy in response to the recession created by the collapse of the stock bubble (although there were far better uses for the money than tax cuts to rich people and fighting unnecessary wars), there is more than a bit of inconsistency in Hubbard's apparent willingness to use deficits to boost the economy out of a recession in the last decade while at the same time disparaging President Obama's efforts to use deficits to lift the economy out of a far deeper hole. The double standard in this piece is explicit. It tells readers: "When Reagan was sworn into office, gross federal debt equaled 32.5 percent of G.D.P. Under President Obama’s leadership, it has risen above 100 percent." Readers may not have realized that the debt to GDP ratio had been a consistent downward path from the end of World War II, when it was over 110 percent of GDP, until President Reagan took office. It then began to rise quickly in the 1980s and early 1990s, reaching more than 70 percent of GDP when the first President Bush left office in early 1993. (This is the total debt, which includes the bonds held by Social Security and other government trust funds.)

Sorry folks, I usually restrict this blog to economic issues, but I am going to stray a little bit here to beat up the NYT over its Room for Debate on Lyme disease. (My wife has Lyme disease.)

Three of the participants in the debate assert that the research shows long-term antibiotic treatment is ineffective for treating people who supposedly suffer from chronic Lyme. The argument is that Lyme is an acute illness that can be effectively treated with 2-3 weeks of antibiotics. In this view, people who continue to experience symptoms after treatment either suffer from some other ailment or are hypochondriacs.

However the claim that the research shows long-term treatment is ineffective is not accurate. Allison DeLong, a statistician at Brown University, reviewed the three most often cited studies that claim to find long-term antibiotic treatment is ineffective. Her analysis showed that one of the studies had insufficient power to reach any conclusion about the effectiveness of treatment.

A second study showed that, while they were being treated, patients were significantly healthier than patients in the control group. This result has been ignored because the study also found that patients relapsed after the end of treatment. In other words, the study concluded that because 3 months of treatment did not cure patients (some of whom had already had years of antibiotic treatment), that treatment was ineffective.

The third study in fact did find that treatment led to a statistically significant improvement in patients’ health according to the main measure the researchers had chosen (a measure of fatigue). However they opted to ignore this finding because the measure was subjective. The researchers also were confused about their own findings, wrongly believing that the double-blind nature of the study had been compromised even though the treatment and control group gave nearly identical answers when asked whether they thought they were being treated.

Given the importance of DeLong’s findings to the Lyme debate it would have been appropriate to include her views in this exchange or to at least find an expert who was familiar with her research. It is a serious disservice to have an exchange on Lyme that does not include any mention of the latest research on the topic. 

Sorry folks, I usually restrict this blog to economic issues, but I am going to stray a little bit here to beat up the NYT over its Room for Debate on Lyme disease. (My wife has Lyme disease.)

Three of the participants in the debate assert that the research shows long-term antibiotic treatment is ineffective for treating people who supposedly suffer from chronic Lyme. The argument is that Lyme is an acute illness that can be effectively treated with 2-3 weeks of antibiotics. In this view, people who continue to experience symptoms after treatment either suffer from some other ailment or are hypochondriacs.

However the claim that the research shows long-term treatment is ineffective is not accurate. Allison DeLong, a statistician at Brown University, reviewed the three most often cited studies that claim to find long-term antibiotic treatment is ineffective. Her analysis showed that one of the studies had insufficient power to reach any conclusion about the effectiveness of treatment.

A second study showed that, while they were being treated, patients were significantly healthier than patients in the control group. This result has been ignored because the study also found that patients relapsed after the end of treatment. In other words, the study concluded that because 3 months of treatment did not cure patients (some of whom had already had years of antibiotic treatment), that treatment was ineffective.

The third study in fact did find that treatment led to a statistically significant improvement in patients’ health according to the main measure the researchers had chosen (a measure of fatigue). However they opted to ignore this finding because the measure was subjective. The researchers also were confused about their own findings, wrongly believing that the double-blind nature of the study had been compromised even though the treatment and control group gave nearly identical answers when asked whether they thought they were being treated.

Given the importance of DeLong’s findings to the Lyme debate it would have been appropriate to include her views in this exchange or to at least find an expert who was familiar with her research. It is a serious disservice to have an exchange on Lyme that does not include any mention of the latest research on the topic. 

This is a nice piece on a non-traditional organizing effort among immigrant construction workers in Texas.

This is a nice piece on a non-traditional organizing effort among immigrant construction workers in Texas.

Liberating the Post Office

Gail Collins took up the Post Office and its large annual losses in her column yesterday. While she does make the point that the Postal Service has been hamstrung by Congress in its efforts to take advantage of its assets to move into new lines of business, this point deserves greater emphasis.

Congress mandated that the Postal Service should be self-sustaining in the same way as a private for-profit company. However it has repeatedly blocked the Postal Service from taking advantage of its enormous assets to move into new lines of business, primarily because it would mean increased competition for other businesses. In addition, as Collins notes, it has imposed a set of prefunding and accounting rules for its pension and retiree health benefits that are far more stringent than those used by any private business in the country.

Faced with the combination of restrictions on efforts to expand into new areas, a dwindling market for first class mail (the bread and butter for the Postal Service), and an impossibly stringent set of accounting rules, it is hardly surprising that the system would face large losses.

Gail Collins took up the Post Office and its large annual losses in her column yesterday. While she does make the point that the Postal Service has been hamstrung by Congress in its efforts to take advantage of its assets to move into new lines of business, this point deserves greater emphasis.

Congress mandated that the Postal Service should be self-sustaining in the same way as a private for-profit company. However it has repeatedly blocked the Postal Service from taking advantage of its enormous assets to move into new lines of business, primarily because it would mean increased competition for other businesses. In addition, as Collins notes, it has imposed a set of prefunding and accounting rules for its pension and retiree health benefits that are far more stringent than those used by any private business in the country.

Faced with the combination of restrictions on efforts to expand into new areas, a dwindling market for first class mail (the bread and butter for the Postal Service), and an impossibly stringent set of accounting rules, it is hardly surprising that the system would face large losses.

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