President Obama Clearly Never Worked For Goldman Sachs
John Tammy, Forbes Staff
For newly minted employees of Goldman Sachs, one of the first things they’re instructed on during training is the ephemeral nature of investment banks. Using deal ‘tombstones’ from decades past, established employees ask them to look closely at the list of now-defunct underwriters of long ago deals.
The purpose of such an exercise is to remind them once again that when it comes to financial institutions, their existence is far from a forever thing. Second, it’s to sear in their minds the basic truth that one false move from an errant employee can bring the whole company down.
Lessons from Goldman Sachs loom large in light of the rollout of President Obama’s signature healthcare legislation, otherwise known as Obamacare. Though it was Obama’s goal to make access to healthcare universal, he left the ACA’s creation largely to Congress and bureaucrats whose creation of Healthcare.gov threatens to wreck any presumed legacy of success for the Obama administration. Had Obama been lucky enough to experience Goldman Sachs training, it’s fair to presume that he wouldn’t have been so lax about letting others write and then create the very legislation that would carry his name.
It’s popular now to suggest that the staggering incompetence that gave us Obamacare is limited to a flawed website. If only that were true. In truth, Obamacare’s problems merely begin with the website, and will grow much worse assuming Heathcare.gov is ever fixed.
That is so because contrary to its billing as a market-based exchange, it’s nothing of the sort. Healthcare.gov at its core is a wealth redistribution scheme that promises to fail for it ignores basic economics.
Indeed, basic economics dictates that there’s no such thing as a ‘free good.’ That’s a major problem because Obamacare not only promised healthcare for all, but it promised gold-plated access to healthcare at costs lower than had previously prevailed in the actual marketplace. To put it very plainly, any legislation that promises more of a market good at a below market price is by definition a very expensive lie.