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Foreword | |
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About the Authors | |
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Introduction: The White House Plants Its Seeds of Destruction | |
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Getting from Seeds of Destruction to Seeds of Prosperity | |
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America's Four Growth Drivers Stall and Our Economy Stagnates | |
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The GDP Growth Drivers Equation | |
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GDP Growth Has Been Well Below Potential Growth | |
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The American Consumer's Roller Coaster | |
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Where Has All the Business Investment Gone? | |
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There's Too Much Government Spending | |
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Net Exports Are a Net Negative | |
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Conclusion | |
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How to Lift the American Economy with the Ten Levers of Growth | |
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Free Markets Free of Corruption and Monopoly Best Promote Growth | |
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Free and Fair Trade Helps All Countries Grow | |
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Entrepreneurship Is the Linchpin of Long-Term Growth | |
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Without Savings, There Can Be No Investment and Growth | |
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Without a Stable Banking System and Strong Financial Markets, Savings Can't Be Transformed into Investment | |
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Innovation and Technological Change Matter More Than Machines and Workers | |
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"Human Capital" Matters as Much as Physical Capital | |
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Oil Price Shocks Stunt the Growth of Oil-Import-Dependent Nations | |
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A Healthy Nation Is a Productive and Prosperous Nation | |
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A Solid Manufacturing Base Makes for a Strong Economy | |
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Fixing America's Destructive Duo: Monetary and Fiscal Policy | |
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Why an Easy-Money Street Is a Dead End | |
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The Return of Fed Activism | |
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The Maestro or a Bubble Maker? | |
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President Obama Crosses the Activist Rubicon | |
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The Road to American Prosperity Cannot Be Paved with a Cheap Dollar | |
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Where Have You Gone, William McChesney Martin? | |
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Why You Can't Stimulate Your Way to Prosperity | |
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From John Maynard Keynes to the Kennedy Tax Cut Revolution | |
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Getting the "Big Three" Right: Tax, Trade, and Energy Policy | |
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Why Raising Taxes Lowers America's Growth Rate | |
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Ideological Gridlock Over Broad-based Tax Reform | |
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From a "Class Tax" to a "Mass Tax" | |
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From Double Taxation to Double Whammies | |
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Income Tax Evolution or Consumption Tax Revolution? | |
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Meeting on the Middle Ground | |
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Why the Best "Jobs Program" May Be Trade Reform | |
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The 2000s: A Decade of Large and Chronic Trade Deficits | |
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America's Trade Deficits Cause Inflation and Loss of Political Sovereignty | |
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The World's Poster Child for the Modern Protectionist-Mercantilist State | |
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China's Great Wall of Protectionism | |
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China's Eighteenth Century Mercantilism | |
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Why America's Foreign Oil Addiction Stunts Our Growth | |
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How Does America's Oil Import Addiction Harm Our Economy? Let Us Count the Ways | |
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Risky Business | |
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Moving Toward Forging a Political Consensus on Reducing Oil Import Dependency | |
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The Smart Path Embraces Both Soft- and Hard-Path Options | |
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The Folly of Energy Independence Redux | |
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Achieving a Targeted Reduction in Oil Dependence | |
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Why This Proposal Has Economic and Political Merit | |
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The Thorny Politics of Oil Import Fees | |
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Good Politics Usually Makes for Bad Economics | |
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Cutting the Gordian Knot of Entitlements | |
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The Imperative of an Economic Rather Than Accounting Solution | |
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Why Social Security Is Easier to Fix Than Medicare and Medicaid | |
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Saving Social Security in Two Easy Pieces | |
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Closing the Social Security Spending Gap: What Won't Work | |
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Closing the Social Security Spending Gap: What Can Work | |
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Forging a Political Consensus | |
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Saving Medicare and Medicaid: Mission Impossible? | |
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A Flexible and Focused Way Forward | |
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Why ObamaCare Makes Our Economy Sick | |
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The Big Health Care Picture | |
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Are We Getting What We Are Paying For? | |
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ObamaCare Puts the Coverage Cart Before the Cost Horse | |
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ObamaCare Provides a Far-Too-Sweet Entitlement | |
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Truth or Consequences | |
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ObamaCare and the Law of Unintended Consequences | |
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Toward a More Market-Driven Health Care System | |
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What Can Be Done? | |
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Conclusion | |
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The American Economy at a Crossroads | |
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How to Prevent Another Financial Crisis-and Housing Bubble | |
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Easy Money | |
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Not Enough "Skin in the Game" for American Home Buyers | |
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Not Enough "Skin in the Game" for Mortgage Lenders | |
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Way-Too-Exotic Mortgages for Borrowers | |
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The Mortgage-Backed Securities Meltdown | |
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The Collateralized Debt Obligations Credit Rating Debacle | |
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A Flawed Insurance Market: Credit Default Swaps | |
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Inflexible Bank Capital | |
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Too Big to Fail: Last Rites for Financial Dinosaurs | |
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A Fragmented and Sectoral Model of Regulation | |
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Subsidies for Nonproductive Investment, Taxes for Productive Investment | |
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The New Law as the End of the Beginning | |
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How to Implement Our Seeds of Prosperity Policy Blueprint | |
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Our Seeds of Destruction Problem | |
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Our Seeds of Prosperity Solution | |
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Conclusion | |
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Index | |