Chart of the Day: The Trump Plan for Prescription Drugs

After griping for hours about President Trump’s upcoming speech on reducing prescription drug prices, you’d think I’d at least listen to the damn thing and then comment on it, wouldn’t you? I guess so. That would be the fair thing to do.

But here’s the thing: Sometimes I get tired of being sucked into long, dry analyses of Republican plans that we all know perfectly well are meaningless. Someone has to do it, and very often that someone is me. It’s my role in the vast politico-industrial complex, after all. But seriously, who cares? Trump himself barely understood what he was reading, and whatever it was, Congress is going to ignore it. Plus it’s Friday, and I’m tired. So fuck it.

Besides, there’s really no need for all that work. There are hundreds of analysts out there who know more than me about this stuff, and they render instant decisions on it via the stock market. So if all you want to know is whether Trump’s plan is good for consumers or good for pharmaceutical companies, just check out how pharmaceutical stocks did as Trump was delivering his speech. If stocks went down, that’s good news for consumers. If stocks went up, it’s good news for drug companies.

Can you guess which way pharmaceutical stocks went? Huh? Can you?

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We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

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