ZadekpediaElizabeth Warren is discussed in two episodes of The Bob Zadek Show, in each case by a guest rather than by Bob Zadek himself. In the 2019 episode with Sally Pipes she is named as a supporter of single-payer Medicare for All; in the 2022 episode with Don Boudreaux she is accused of misattributing the causes of inflation.
Single-payer Medicare for All
Sally Pipes described single-payer Medicare for All as envisioned by Senator Bernie Sanders, the House member from Washington state, Pramila Jayapal, and Elizabeth Warren, and sometimes the Senator from California, Kamala Harris. Under this arrangement, Pipes said, there would be one payer for all healthcare, and that would be the government; under the Sanders and Jayapal plans the government would also be the provider, with only the Veterans Administration and the Indian Health Services left outside a single system into which everything else would be rolled. Sally Pipes on the High Cost of Free Stuff (2019)
Pipes said that Warren is in Bernie’s camp and is pushing single-payer. She contrasted Warren with Kamala Harris, who Pipes said had said in Des Moines, Iowa, earlier that year that she supported single-payer and wanted to get rid of the insurance companies, then backtracked; in the first debate, Pipes said, Harris raised her hand when the host asked who supported single-payer, along with Sanders, Warren, the New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, and herself, and later that night said she had not really understood the question. Sally Pipes on the High Cost of Free Stuff (2019)
Pipes placed the candidates in two groups: those who support single-payer like Bernie, and those she called a stepping-stone approach to single-payer, such as Joe Biden’s support for a public option — a government insurance company competing in the insurance exchanges in the states and healthcare.gov with private carriers. In Pipes’s account, all of the plans being talked about would crowd out private coverage and ultimately produce a single-payer Medicare for All system. Sally Pipes on the High Cost of Free Stuff (2019)
Inflation and the “Big Grocery” claim
In the 2022 episode, Don Boudreaux said that Elizabeth Warren had recently blamed the rise in grocery prices not on her own institution, the government, which he said had injected unprecedented amounts of purchasing power into the economy, but on greed and on the alleged monopolization of retail grocery. He called this absurd: people do not spend greed units, Americans spend dollars, and if there are no more dollars to spend prices cannot rise. Liz Warren’s Crusade against “Big Grocery (2022)
Boudreaux listed Amazon, Walmart, Target, Kroger, Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods among the options for buying groceries and said there is enormous competition in retail grocery. He said Warren’s blame of greed and monopolization showed that she is either astonishingly economically ill-informed or mendacious, with no third alternative. Liz Warren’s Crusade against “Big Grocery (2022)
Bob Zadek put the complaint in his own terms: Warren had been public and outspoken about what she perceived as bad behavior, had used the word greed, had been unhappy that grocery stores were motivated by greed rather than by a duty to be good stewards of investors’ money, and had been complaining that they unlawfully focused on profits at the expense of customers. Zadek said she had been inviting, if not demanding, antitrust action against the grocery stores on the ground that they have a monopoly, and asked where the crime was other than earning a profit, adding that if they are a monopoly they are very bad at it because their profit margins are so low. Liz Warren’s Crusade against “Big Grocery (2022)
Boudreaux called this political grandstanding and said he had trouble believing even she is so stupid as to think the rise in prices today is caused by the monopolization of consumer retail, which he called the most competitive industry in the world. He said prices are rising because of the evil being done in the very institution in which Warren plays such a large and dominant role, that is the government; she voted in favor of prolific spending programs, and the Federal Reserve has been injecting spending power into the economy. He said she does not dare look in the mirror to put the blame on herself, and that the fact he thinks she does know better does not speak well to her ethics. Liz Warren’s Crusade against “Big Grocery (2022)
Boudreaux said Warren has no evidence of monopolization and has presented none, other than the fact that prices are rising, and quoted Milton Friedman’s statement that inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon. He said Warren and her cronies in Congress want credit for increasing spending without facing the consequences, and are trying to pass the buck onto innocent parties. Liz Warren’s Crusade against “Big Grocery (2022)
Across episodes
The two episodes touch Warren on unrelated topics — healthcare in 2019 with Sally Pipes, inflation and grocery pricing in 2022 with Don Boudreaux — and the episodes show no development in the show’s treatment of her between the earlier and later discussion.