What is it with left-of-center public servants emulating Richard Nixon these days?
As Reason's Steve Chapman sees it, President Obama has hopped on the Nixon policy bandwagon in a big way:
So how does Obama intend to make health insurance affordable? He wants the federal government to regulate premiums from coast to coast.
This approach mirrors Nixon's disastrous wage and price control program. Chapman relates how it worked out for Nixon:
Nixon's own chief economist, Herbert Stein, admitted that the administration eventually had to give up because the program was "a total disaster." Among the unwanted side effects: "Cattle were being withheld from market, chickens were drowned, and the food store shelves were being emptied." Motorists had to wait in line for hours to buy gasoline. At one point, Americans faced a nationwide shortage of toilet paper. Yes, toilet paper. Oh, and the inflation rate didn't fall. It rose.
I wonder what President Obama will try when he finds out that price controls don't work. Ford-style sloganeering?
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