Economist and blogger Glen Whitman has an excellent article in the latest Cato Policy Report on the latest fad in health policy: requiring people to purchase health insurance, a.k.a. an “individual mandate.” Hillary, Arnold, Mitt, John … the kids, they just love this individual mandate! If you read only one article on the topic, let this be it.


Whitman adds a post‐​script to that article in a recent post:

Something I don’t mention in the article is why some free‐​market types support the individual mandate. In short, I think the reason is that they have given too little attention to the political dynamics of such a mandate, instead naively assuming that the mandate could be crafted once‐​and‐​for‐​all in a wise and lobbying‐​resistant fashion.