Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris has pledged an economic policy of government price controls. Her anti-“price gouging” reaction may play great at the Democratic faithful’s convention in Chicago, but it’s not likely to play in Peoria—or Phoenix or Green Bay or Winston-Salem or anywhere in Georgia outside of liberal pockets of Atlanta.
Harris is talking about using price controls against groceries. But no one believes she’ll merely apply price controls so narrowly.
The Biden-Harris administration recently announced its first round of the U.S. government setting Medicare Part D drug prices. The “Inflation Reduction Act’s” drug price control measure starts with 10 medicines and escalates from there.
Above all else, know this: Harris and Biden own the highest inflation we’ve suffered in decades. They’re primarily responsible for inflation’s spike and its continued costly effects.
Harris broke the tie in the 2022 Senate vote to push the IRA into law. The IRA along with the 2021 $2 trillion “American Rescue Plan” stimulated inflation. Just because the rate of inflation has now eased to about 3%, we’re still stuck with the inflated prices of many things that remain at or well above the 9% inflation high-water mark Biden-Harris caused.
As I warned in 2020, Biden and Harris would be—and have been—a disaster in health care. See my Washington Times op-ed from four years ago and be forewarned yet again.
On drug price controls, Harris’s new DNC platform calls for adding 50 medicines a year to the IRA price controls in order to reach 500 prescription drugs.
Thanks to Harris, Biden and their IRA, seniors are experiencing higher Medicare and Part D costs along with significant disruptions in their health coverage. This year, there are the fewest standalone Part D plans since the program’s creation.
Some 89% of health insurers expect to drop more medicines from their Part D plans. Medicare patients are highly likely to see more coverage restrictions, like step therapy. And Part D premiums will rise for many seniors.
The hype from Harris, Biden and Democrats has claimed that IRA drug price controls will save beneficiaries on prescription costs. However, most Part D patients won’t see any cost savings from price setting.
Rather, they’re likely to face higher out-of-pocket costs. Assessing different plan designs offered, Milliman determines that IRA drug price setting’s out-of-pocket impact in 2026 will see more than 3 million beneficiaries paying more to take government-priced medicines.
There's also the Harris drag on the economy. Andy Laperriere notes in the Wall Street Journal that economies expand only when greater output is achieved. Higher output “comes from higher productivity, technological innovation, and increased labor input.”
But Harris’s rein of price controls and regulatory terror will weigh like an anchor on productivity gains, innovation and work incentives. Laperriere warns that Harris’s “economic agenda is price controls, higher energy costs, record regulatory costs on the private sector, and an array of government handouts.”
The National Association of Manufacturers estimates the total cost U.S. regulations impose is $3.1 trillion annually. The Competitive Enterprise Institute’s estimate of total yearly compliance costs and economic effects of federal regulations is $2.1 trillion. The Biden-Harris administration has wielded a much heavier regulatory hand than its immediate predecessor administrations, CEI says.
Ask anyone who’s lived under a government-run health system and they can tell you that price controls don’t work. Government price controls cause shortages, black markets, rationing and inflation—just like the real-world results that are beginning to appear in Medicare.
Columnist Catherine Rampell recently pointed to the lack of detail Harris has disclosed about her price control plans. Rampell’s best guess about its particulars leads her to write, “It’s hard to exaggerate how bad this policy is . . . a sweeping set of government-enforced price controls across every industry, not only food.”
Rampell’s advice to Harris exposes what’s behind Harris’s “price gouging” fraud: “If your opponent claims you’re a ‘communist,’ maybe don’t start with an agenda that can (accurately) be labeled as federal price controls.”