misleading headline

Hi folks,

I'm beginning to notice that the most misleading parts of the New York Times news articles are the headlines.  That may be true for newspapers generally.  Today's Business section has an item entitled "Overhaul of Israel's Economy has lessons for United States".  The  headline should read "Overhaul of Israel's Economy does not have lessons for United States".  Briefly, Israel, a small country, has 30% of its economy controlled by a small number of very successful entrepreneurs.  In an effort to reduce income inequality, Israel is breaking up these tightly controlled companies. 

If you read to the very end of the page-long article, the author admits that "the American economy is very different from Israel's".  Our economy is much more diverse and non-concentrated, and even the largest conglomerates like General Electric don't have the kind of monopolistic power that Israel's elite apparently has, or had before passage of the law that breaks them up.  In fact, Israel's action reminds me of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act of 1890, and of Teddy Roosevelt's trust-busting at the turn of the 20th century.  This activity preceded America's transformation from a weak small nation to a world power.  I don't know if economic historians give credit to trust-busting, but a first-year economics course teaches you that monopolies and oligopolies weaken economies.  Israel's goal may have been to reduce income inequality, but the result may be a stronger economy for all.  In fact, couldn't the headline have read, "Overhaul of Israel's Economy learned lessons from the United States history"? 

This is another topic, but income inequality has worsened under Obama, despite the massive increase in spending on food stamps, stimulus programs, and now Obamacare.  Why is that?  Obama's being upset about income inequality sounds similar to his being upset about the IRS targeting tea party groups.  Really!  When will this administration and its allies take responsibility for their own actions?

Along the same lines, yesterday's Washington Post had a blog post which blames Republicans for the woes of the Obamacare website.  You see, if the Republicans had supported Medicaid expansion, then the Federal website would not have been needed, and state websites have done a better job of enrolling people.  There's a lesson in this that nobody discusses; namely, that state-run programs work better than Federally-run programs.  And nobody but nobody mentions the achievement of Mitt Romney in Massachusetts, who got Romneycare up and running without all this pain and suffering.   More to come.