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Cutting Corners and Nickel-and-Diming Customers
In macroeconomics, the “circular flow of income” refers to the continuous flow of money between producers and consumers in the economy. Producers provide goods and…
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FTC declares mergers to be union-busting
In a classic case of regulatory creep, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has recently asserted jurisdiction over labor unions and collective bargaining. The agency is…
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This week in ridiculous regulations: Baby formula waivers and phonorecords
The 2023 Federal Register became the second-largest ever, dating back to 1936. A new CEI study makes the case for reforming administrative law…
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Congress Seems Intent on Making Drug Shortages Worse
Now that the problem of prescription drug shortages has begun to affect children, members of Congress want to be seen as…
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Government Thwarts Cancer Cures and Production of Life-Saving Drugs
The federal government thwarted a promising cancer treatment. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) put Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski on trial twice, saying “it did…
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CEI Podcast for February 2, 2012: The FDA’s Latest Power Grab
Fellow in Consumer Policy Studies Michelle Minton breaks down the FDA's behind-the-scenes push to regulate dietary supplements nearly as strictly as prescription drugs.
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Michigan SEIU Scam the Product of Government Collective Bargaining
Proponents of government collective bargaining view it as a fundamental human right. The shameful actions of SEIU in Michigan, however, undermine this claim. In…
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Obama, Scientific Integrity, and the State of the Union
With the State of the Union coming up, I’ve been wondering whether, or how, President Obama might address the Plan B fiasco…
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War on Drugs Keeps Badly Needed, Perfectly Legal Medicine Away from Sick People
Sick people, like those suffering from narcolepsy, are suffering from a manufacturing shortage of Adderall. That shortage was caused by the Drug Enforcement Agency,…
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Obamacare Stifles Job Creation, Causes Layoffs
At Bloomberg News, Andrew Puzder, CEO of CKE Restaurants, Inc., explains how the 2010 healthcare law is preventing jobs from being created and resulting…
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2011 Brought Lots of Good News for Salt Lovers
With holiday cooking on most of our minds this week, it's worth celebrating some good news about one of the most beleaguered food ingredients: table salt. For…
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FDA Needs to Act on Internet and Social Media Policy
Way back in September 2009, the Food and Drug Administration announced that it would begin using the social media site Twitter to share news and other…
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FDA Was Right to Deny Petition to Restrict Animal Antibiotics
I didn't have a chance to write about it then, but a few weeks back the Food and Drug Administration denied a…
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Over-The-Counter Plan B? What Would Jed Bartlet Do?
Back in March 2009, President Obama issued a memorandum on scientific integrity to the heads of executive branch agencies and departments.
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Good News/Bad News on Compensating Bone Marrow Donors
By now, there's been plenty of news highlighting last week's decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals that the National Organ…
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Legalizing Kidney Sales Would Save Thousands of Lives, Save Taxpayers a Bundle
Kidney sales should be legal, explains kidney donor Alexander Berger in The New York Times. Berger is a research analyst for GiveWell, a nonprofit that…
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Is the Four Loko/FTC Settlement on the Rocks?
If you're a regular reader of OpenMarket.org, then you know we at CEI have written quite a bit on the issue of Four Loko.
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CEI Podcast for November 23, 2011: The Most Expensive Regulation of All Time?
What is the single most expensive regulation of all time? Energy Policy Analyst William Yeatman has one candidate: the EPA’s proposal to regulate mercury emissions…
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Sen. Hagan Bill Would Expand Accelerated Drug Approval
According to Bloomberg News, North Carolina Democratic Senator Kay Hagan is set to introduce a bill that would create new “progressive”…
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What’s in My Makeup Bag? — Junkscience
The Oregon Environmental Council and the regional government for the Portland, Oregon, metropolitan area recently released a survey of young women regarding their personal…
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Smokers’ Opportunity to Quit Smoking Opposed by Blinkered Anti-Tobacco Zealots
As The New York Times' John Tierney notes, a tool to quit smoking and save lives is being blocked by anti-tobacco zealots: If you…
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Obama Administration Contributes to Life-Threatening Drug Shortages Even as it Decries Them
In a recent column, Michelle Malkin explained how Obamacare price controls, FDA and DEA rules, and Obama administration policies have contributed to shortages of…
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Biotechnology’s 29th Anniversary!
Twenty-nine years ago tomorrow, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Eli Lilly’s and Genentech’s Humulin, making it the first ever fully…
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Hyper-Active Headlines on BPA
The journal Pediatics recently published findings from a research study suggesting that children exposed to the chemical bisphenol A (aka, BPA, which is a…
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Beware of Asking FDA to Change Itself
Every five years, Congress must reauthorize a piece of legislation called the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA), which gives the…
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FDA Approves Device To Help Doctors Detect Skin Cancer
There's an unusual bit of good news out of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. In March 2010 and again last November, the…
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Flushing Oral Oncology Drugs Down the Toilet?
An interesting article in the Journal of Clinical Oncology (via yesterday's Jerusalem Post) argues that the U.S. Food and…
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The Mythical Benefits of Plastic Bag Bans Debunked
Some municipalities have now imposed taxes or restrictions on plastic shopping bags, even though banning or taxing plastic bags has little effect on litter, and…
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A “Condom Mandate” is No Benefit for Adult Film Actors
I heard the news while driving home from work: a California porn star tested positive for HIV, resulting in a voluntary…
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Who’s Afraid of Snuggles the Bear?
As the East Coast braces to be pummeled by Hurricane Irene, a new study in the Journal Air Quality and Atmosphere…
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EPA-Backed Study: Products Containing BPA Harmless
The US Environmental Protection Agency officially backed a study last week underscores what scientists around the world have been saying for years: BPA is not…
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Environmental Working Group’s ‘Dirty Dozen’ List Debunked
The Environmental Working Group seems to exist for no other reason than to scare consumers away from the products of modern technology -- and to…
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Weird Healthcare Regulation of the Day: No Coverage for Men With Breast Cancer
"Disease does not discriminate, but apparently Medicaid coverage does. A 26-year-old South Carolina tile-layer has found himself with breast cancer and out of luck for…
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Obamacare Costs Additional $50 Billion a Year More Than Predicted, Based on Yet Another False Assumption in Calculating its Costs
“Federal payments required by President Barack Obama’s health care law are being understated by as much as $50 billion per year because official budget forecasts…
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The Limits of Government-Funded Psychology: 9/11 Counseling Backfires
After school shootings, psychologists fan out and provide “grief counseling” to student bodies, but it’s far from clear that this does any good. Critics say…
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Stop Messing with My Daughter’s Happy Meal!
There are apples and other fruit sitting around my house, and my four-year-old daughter can eat an apple anytime. By contrast, she seldom gets to…
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More Confusion on Breast Cancer Screening
When the federal government's Preventive Services Task Force recommended in November 2009 that most women under age 50 should stop having regular…
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Killed by Regulations: New Century Brewing, RIP
Add another name to the list of the dead as a result of actions taken by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). I certainly feel a…
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Scientific American Busts Organic Food Myths
Over at the Scientific American magazine blogs, science writer Christie Wilcox takes on some of the mythology surrounding organic foods, including the…
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Michelle Obama’s 1700 Calorie Hypocrisy
I am no fan of ad hominem attacks, especially when it’s the President and his administration that deserve true criticism for their policies. So, when…
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Sour Attitudes on Raw Milk
In a letter to the Washington Post over this past weekend, a “food safety consultant” in northern Virginia named Thomas L.
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Meet Your New Mom: Kathleen Sebelius and Cigarette Warnings
Health and Human Services Director Kathleen Sebelius recently made a revealing statement on how she perceives the role of government and her place within…
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A Peek Inside the Bureaucrat’s Mind
By now, this story about the city of Portland, Oregon, deciding to drain nearly 8 million gallons of water from one…
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Improve Americans’ Physical and Fiscal Health: Cut Out the FDA
President Obama made a big show about cutting “red tape” government regulations that kill jobs and hurt the economy. In addition, members of the…
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Bed Bugs Now With Super Bug: Still Just a “Nuisance,” EPA?
As my colleague Angela Logomasini noted in a post in January, the EPA has rebuffed the desperate pleas of lawmakers and residents to un-ban…
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FDA Overkill on Cigarette Packaging
Get ready to see nine sensationalistic images depicting the dangers of smoking on cigarette packs beginning September 2012. Rotted lungs and teeth, chest holes,…
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No Such Thing as an Average Cancer Patient
CEI Senior Fellow Greg Conko has an excellent piece in today's Wall Street Journal. Greg doesn't think it's right that the FDA is denying terminally…
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FDA Should Not Mandate Comparative Effectiveness Trials
AEI resident fellow Scott Gottlieb has a new paper out explaining why the FDA should not force…
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E. Coli Outbreak Linked to Organic Farming … Again
Although it’s not 100 percent certain at this time, German health officials are becoming increasingly certain that the recent E. coli…
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CEI Podcast for May 31, 2011: FDA Rescinds Approval of Breast Cancer Drug
Conko believes this battle boils down to one question: who decides which treatments patients can use? Will it be the FDA, or doctors and patients?…
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New York City Health Officials: No Fun for Adults
Last year we watched as the FDA used its regulatory might to institute a de-facto ban on alcoholic energy drinks like Four Loko, Joose,…
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Avastin and Breast Cancer: The Median is Not the Message
The New York Times ran an op-ed yesterday by oncologist Frederick Tucker urging the Food and Drug Administration to stand by…
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New York Times on “Paternalistic” Government
The Dining section of today’s New York Times has a short piece reporting that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has lowered…