In 1996, Congress and President Clinton enacted legislation that requires health insurance companies to provide -- and requires consumers to buy -- certain health benefits. These mandated benefits were hailed as a "consensus" approach to health care reform. Today, a number of additional health benefit mandates are being proposed. This paper discusses how mandated benefits do more harm than good.

In March, 1994, President Clinton signed his Administration's education "reform" legislation, the "Goals 2000: Educate America Act" into law. The education package sets out a number of goals to be achieved over a period of six years, including the following:

There are serious, legitimate concerns surrounding outcome-based education (OBE). In principle, it sounds good. In practice, however, OBE can be used to undermine parental authority and traditional moral and religious beliefs. This explains why much of the criticism of OBE has come largely from parents' rights groups.

During testimony today before the Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee, Citizens for a Sound Economy Director of Research Michael Becker advocated modifying, and and eventually eliminating entirely, the sugar program. “Due to the sugar program,” testified Becker, “CSE’s members, along with consumers in general, each year pay excessive prices for food simply to enrich the small group of sugar farmers and corn refiners who benefit from the sugar program.”