Peter Orszag, President Obama’s former OMB director, has a rather depressing column in which he predicts the future of health care in America. He thinks employer health care will go the route that private pensions have gone, being replaced by individual 401(k) plans. He also thinks the Affordable Care Act he helped create will accelerate [...]

Peter Orszag has an oped in the New York Times regarding Social Security. It’s full of the usual Orszag claptrap in which he sets himself up as the sober, responsible judge, while “the left… seems adamantly opposed to restoring actuarial balance to Social Security.” Orszag ends with this: Given the left’s strident opposition to any [...]

OMB director Peter Orszag and MIT economists Jonathan Gruber are both very smart, successful individuals. While I may not agree with them on every policy, that does not mean I don’t respect their intelligence. Both have knowledge and perspective to add to the health care debate. The problem is that it turns out they have [...]

It is a good thing that Democrats are trying to put together a bill that will massively expand coverage while reducing the deficit and slightly reducing premiums for a majority of Americans. That is a serious accomplishment, and something to brag about. What the Senate bill does not do is take the serious steps that [...]

During a conference call with reports Peter Orszag defended the Senate health care reform bill’s minor cost-control measures: Orszag suggested that others who have questioned the bill haven’t been as thorough as Brownstein. He noted that The Atlantic reporter identified specific pages of the bill while interviewing him for the piece. “I would say to [...]

It is amazing to me that some reporters honestly believe Obama would “prefer a strong public option.” All the evidence points to the contrary. For months Obama has been trying to down play the public option. His advisers have been running around saying anything (triggers or co-ops) would be acceptable substitutes even after the CBO [...]

In an interview with Bloomberg.com, White House Budget Director Peter Orszag talked about his support for so-called "co-ops" and "triggers." Orszag signaled the administration doesn’t consider a government-run insurance program essential to the legislation. He suggested it would be sufficient to either create nonprofit insurance-purchasing cooperatives or set “triggers” to activate a public option if [...]