Bill Gates: 'In rich-world health, innovation is both your friend and your enemy'

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How foreign voices influence American wars

_Poli-Sci Perspective is a weekly Wonkblog feature in which Georgetown University's _ _Dan Hopkins_ _and George Washington University's _ _Danny_ _Hayes_ _and _ _John Sides_ _ offer an empirical perspective on the issues dominating Washington. In this edition, Hayes looks at the way foreign leaders can influence America's foreign policy. For past posts in the series, head _ _here_ _._ Read fu

Here's why hospitals set high prices

"The most expensive hospital in America is not set amid the swaying palm trees of Beverly Hills or the luxury townhouses of New York's Upper East Side," Julie Creswell, Barry Meier and Jo Craven McGinty wrote last week in the New York Times. "It is in a faded blue-collar town 11 miles from Midtown Manhattan." Read full article >>

Ben Bernanke on robots, lasers and the Great Stagnation

Every year, it seems, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke gives a commencement speech, and every year, the occasion provides him with a rare opportunity to venture far beyond his usual monetary policy-speak. This year, he mentions robots and lasers! Read full article >>

Scientists agree on climate change. So why doesn't everyone else?

Here's a finding that shouldn't be all that surprising: Since 1991, roughly 97 percent of all published scientific papers that take a position on the question agree that humans are warming the planet.That stat comes from thisextensive new survey led by John Cook and Dana Nuccitelli, who run the Skeptical Science website. And it builds on earlier studies finding the exact same thing. Read ful

Sheila Bair: Dodd-Frank really did end taxpayer bailouts

_Sheila Bair, the hard-charging former director of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, stands at the center of three of the biggest debates in Dodd-Frank implementation._ _As someone who knows the FDIC — which is actually the agency that takes down failing banks — she's in an unusually good position to know whether the law's resolution authority will work. These are the new powers th

Five takeaways from the CBO's analysis of Obama's budget

For the most part, the description of President Obama's budget found in the Congressional Budget Office's analysis of it jibes with the description included in the initial budget release. But the CBO analysis does highlight some interesting features of the proposal. Here are a few. Read full article >>

The best sentences we read today

-- "Witnessessay alcohol may have played a factor in the man's ill-advised science experiment."-- "Watching [the new Star Trek movie] is like talking to a salesman who stops every 40 seconds to ask if you're still with him, and then slaps you in the face just to make sure." Read full article >>

The view from the I.R.S.'s Cincinnati office

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This is the only graph you need on Washington's budget debate

The Congressional Budget Office released their analysis of President Obama's 2014 budget proposal today. The bottom line? It more than solves our deficit problem for the next decade, and for some time beyond that. And unlike the status quo — which also reduces the deficit, though not by as much — it brings the deficit down gradually over 10 years, rather than reducing it sharply over the next tw

Food aid reform is running into trouble in Congress

One of the attention-grabbing ideas in the White House's 2014 budget was a big overhaul of the $1.4 billion U.S. food aid program. Instead of buying food from U.S. farmers and shipping it overseas, some of the money would just be sent directly to poor countries. Read full article >>

How the FBI's online wiretapping plan could get your computer hacked

The FBI is pushing for expanded power to eavesdrop on private Internet communications. The law enforcement agency wants to force online service providers to build wiretapping capabilities into their products. But a group of prominent computer security experts argues that mandating "back doors" in online communications products is likely to compromise the security of Americans' computers and coul

'Soul Train' meets Daft Punk

You know what was a great show? "Soul Train." You know what's a great song? Daft Punk's "Get Lucky." You know what two things are mashed up in the below video? I think you know:Hat-tip to a very effusive Gabe Delahaye. Read full article >>

The Senate has passed 48 amendments to the immigration bill. Here's what they do.

We're only three days into the Senate Judiciary Committee's markup of S. 744, the Gang of Eight's immigration bill, but already 48 amendments to the bill have been adopted. Forty two passed by voice vote, and six by roll call. Many are technical corrections but a few make real, serious changes to the bill. Let's go through them, day by day. Read full article >>

'The Office' business lesson: Don't be anything like Dunder Mifflin

Most people enjoyed "The Office" most for the antics of boss Michael Scott, or the touching relationship between paper salesman Jim Halpert and erstwhile receptionist Pam Beesly. I liked the show, which aired its finale after nine seasons Thursday night, best when it gave us a window into the business practices of this particular office. Read full article >>

When Medicare launched, nobody had any clue whether it would work

_Welcome to Health Reform Watch, Sarah Kliff's regular look at how the Affordable Care Act is changing the American health-care system — and being changed by it. You can reach Sarah with questions, comments and suggestions here. Check back every Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoon for the latest edition, and read previous columns here._ Read full article >>

How the geography of U.S. immigration has changed over time

Where do immigrants to the United States come from? A new Pew report finds that this has been slowly changing over time. In 1992, most legal immigrants came from Latin America and Europe. Nowadays, they're more likely to come from Asia and Africa: Read full article >>

In a drive toward reform, World Bank’s Jim Yong Kim turns to a ‘deliverologist’

The advice Sir Michael Barber offers about public management is not warm and fuzzy.If a narrow monopoly interferes with service delivery, break it. If cronyism supplants merit hiring, bust it up. If a school or hospital or train line runs behind, offer the support needed to improve — then track the performance relentlessly and ride whoever is responsible until it does. Read full article >>

Wonkbook: House Republicans hate Obamacare. But they also kind of need it.

_Welcome to Wonkbook, Ezra Klein and Evan Soltas's morning policy news primer. To subscribe by e-mail, click here. Send comments, criticism, or ideas to Wonkbook at Gmail dot com. To read more by Ezra and his team, go to Wonkblog._ Read full article >>

Bill Gates: 'Death is something we really understand extremely well'

_"I always use this chart of childhood death," Bill Gates says. "In 1960, 25% of kids died before the age of 5. And now we're down below 6% of kids dying before the age of 5."_ _We're sitting in a bare conference room at his foundation's D.C. headquarters. Gates is in town to talk to members of Congress about his top priority this year: Global health and, in particular, the total eradicatio

Bill Gates: 'Death is something we really understand extremely well'

_"I always use this chart of childhood death," Bill Gates says. "In 1960, 25% of kids died before the age of 5. And now we're down below 6% of kids dying before the age of 5."_ _We're sitting in a bare conference room at his foundation's D.C. headquarters. Gates -- who Bloomberg News calculates is once again the world's richest man -- is in town to talk to members of Congress about his top

Fed officials differ on direction of recovery

Federal Reserve officials are grappling with how to decipher the economy’s mixed signals and what to do with the central bank’s multibillion-dollar stimulus effort.The past two days have brought an unusual but uncoordinated flurry of speeches by the central bank’s top brass. Six Fed officials outlined diverse — and sometimes opposing — interpretations of the direction of the recovery and the

U.S. may strip Bangladesh of tariff breaks

The Obama administration may strip Bangladesh of import breaks following deadly accidents in the country’s textile industry, another sign of the pressure building on the Southeast Asian nation to improve labor conditions. Read full article >>

Future retirees at risk of downward mobility, Pew finds

The retirement prospects of Americans are slipping for the first time in generations, according to a report released Thursday, adding a new voice to those warning that future retirees face the risk of downward mobility when they leave the workforce. Read full article >>

Eric Holder endorses warrants for e-mail. It's about time.

Testifying before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, Attorney General Eric Holder declared his support for requiring the government to get a warrant before reading Americans' e-mail. It's about time. Read full article >>

If Obama went Bulworth, here's what he'd say

_The New York Times reported Thursday that President Obama frequently fantasizes to close aides about "going Bulworth," a reference to the 1998 movie in which Sen. Jay Bulworth, played by Warren Beatty, drops all pretense and begins saying exactly what he thinks. So I asked a number of ex-Obama aides and political consultants what the president would say if he went Bulworth. This post is based

The federal government wants to change the definition of 'drunk'

Time to close your tab: The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) wants to reduce the amount of booze you have to drink to count as a "drunk driver."Currently, the threshold is set at a blood alcohol content of 0.08 percent, as a result of a transportation bill signed into law by President Clinton in 2000, which stated that states had to adopt the 0.08 threshold by 2004 or else have the

Why the health cost slowdown is great for grandparents

The recent slowdown in health care costs matters a lot for the federal government, which buys health benefits for tens of millions of Americans. It also turns out to matter significantly for retirees.A couple retiring this year areprojected to need $220,000 to cover their health care costs, a decrease of 8 percent from the $240,000 that Fidelity projected for those leaving the workforce in 20

Here's why remote state capitals are often more corrupt

Why are some capital cities more corrupt than others? Two recent economic working papers offer a novel theory — geography might be to blame. In particular, capitals that are more isolated from the rest of the state or country tend to be more corrupt. Read full article >>

Surprise! Inflation is too low almost everywhere on earth

The leading economies of the industrialized nations may not have a lot in common, but they are all afflicted by this: Inflation is too low.That was the astoundingly consistent theme out of a range of data released Thursday. Prices rose1.1 percent over the 12 months that ended in April in Germany, 0.8 percent in France and 1.3 percent in Italy. In the United States, the consumer price index ro