Category: Politics, Religion & Money

A Tax By Any Other Name

It may be bad timing using Airplane! to make a point about Trump’s tariffs, but economists are concerned about them.

https://econbrowser.com/archives/2025/02/i-guess-i-picked-the-wrong-week

It’s beyond comprehension that Trump continues to insist that an IMPORT TAX will be paid by the exporting country. One option would be for the exporter to accept reduced revenue as a way to maintain export volume:

  1. A $100 item is levied with a 25% tariff
  2. The item now costs $125 in the United States
  3. The export price is reduced from $100 to $80
  4. The resulting price with the 25% tariff is back at $100
  5. No net negative effect on the consumer
  6. No reduction in demand

Will that happen? Not likely, but that’s how it would have to work. One way to consider the tariffs as a good thing, is to think of them as compensating for the further tax cuts to come for those who don’t need them. I’ve convinced myself that was a reason why Biden kept Trump’s first term China tariffs in place.

Common Senselessness

Trump doesn’t need to invalidate the 22nd Amendment to make the next four years seem like eight.

“I have common sense, OK?” Trump said when pressed what evidence he had to give credence to the blame he piled on the Biden and Obama administrations. “Unfortunately, a lot of people don’t.”

https://www.cnn.com/2025/01/30/politics/donald-trump-dc-plane-crash/index.html

HIT Me!

If I weren’t retired from my former, longtime place of employment, I would be keeping a close watch on the government’s Healthcare Information Technology site. Maybe I should do that anyway, considering the possibility that RFK, Jr. will have control of the Dept. of HHS.

https://www.healthit.gov/

There’s skuttlebutt that this Texas organization of small and rural hospitals wants to negotiate as a single entity with Epic Systems.

https://www.torchnet.org/

Community hospitals and critical access hospitals are the one remaining American market for software that Epic doesn’t dominate. Or, should I say, doesn’t yet dominate.

Epic manages up to 80% of non-military American medical records. If Epic makes a significant gain into the remaining 20%, that will squeeze out my former employer, which has been struggling to regain its footing for almost fifteen years, since the HITECH Act within ARRA went into effect. It’s a bitter irony that Epic runs on software technology created by my former employer, and Epic was a customer of ours during its formative years.

Update: RFK, Jr. is now head of the Department of HHS. If the bird flu becomes communicable between humans, with a fatality rate of up to 50%, say buh-bye to civilization.