ECONOMISTS, POLICY ENTREPRENEURS, AND HEALTH-CARE REFORM

Economists would have formulated several aspects of the health care re form debate differently than policy entrepreneurs did. Economists woul d have questioned whether health care costs must be contained and whet her either competition or global budgets were a ''magic bullet'' for d oing so. They also would have emphasized the distortive costs of subsi dies and taxes necessary to reach universal coverage, as well as the s hakiness of the arguments about international competitiveness and exce ss insurance industry profits.