@snood,
snood wrote:
All that excerpt does is reiterate that Bernie made an impossible promise.
Possibly just one of many. The odds of getting a congress that would vote the added entitlements and taxes he proposes appear vanishingly small.
Government subsidies for almost anything have three immediate effects;
1. The creation of a well organized political lobby dedicated to the preservation of the subsidy.
2. The end of any incentive for improving the efficient delivery of the product or service or its quality.
3. Increases in the price of the product or service subsidized.
We've already seen bubbles in the housing market resulting from the infusion of large quantities of government guaranteed capital. College tuition costs have risen fast along with government secured college tuition loans which will burden graduates for a long time. Corn based ethanol is now well-known to deliver no reduction in carbon emissions at all. However, the ethanol mixed in the fuel shortens the lives of the engines, and the corn demand raises food prices. Still the subsidies and mandates for its use persist.
Bernie's programs are unlikley to be enacted, but if implemented would have analogous effects.