Today's guest is Reason's Eric Boehm, a reporter and the host of the podcast Why We Can't Have Nice Things. The first season of the podcast exposed how little-understood trade policies and regulations screwed with the pricing and availability of everything from baby formula to women's underwear to frozen chicken.
The new season focuses on laws and policies that screw up the supply and costs of health care. It debuts on Thursday, September 5, with the first episode featuring billionaire Mark Cuban talking about his company Cost Plus Drugs, which sells prescription drugs directly to consumers at super-low prices. Coming episodes cover how "certificate of need" laws increase the price and reduce the availability of hospital beds, why bans on organ donor compensation cause the death of thousands every year, how restrictions on telemedicine hurt patients with no gain in safety, and how the Food and Drug Administration and Drug Enforcement Administration make legal pharmaceuticals like Adderall tougher and tougher to get.