the u.s., trump's instinct was the u.s. should get the best price of any country because we are the biggest market and purchaser. that is a technique a lot of other countries use. if you look around the world, even in canada, a lot of what the other countries do is start from the baseline of how they negotiate price with the pharmaceutical industry. they say we are going to look at the prices negotiated with all these other countries and based off negotiations of that. that is called reference pricing. president trump was simply trying to do the same thing here and the idea did not carry over to the biden administration. a biden administration through that overboard when they came in which i think was unfortunate because that could've been a useful technique to add to the arsenal but we can revisit that at a later time. host: mr. roy, the inflation reduction act as 15% corporate tax. what does that do for those who

manufacture drugs? guest: it is interesting because the biotechnology and history and the pharmaceutical industry should have been much more bothered by that. because that is going to be much more economically impactful to those companies bottom lines than the 20 drugs that are being negotiated by the government. i think the trade associations in that sense did themselves no favors by fighting so hard to make more drugs less affordable on the negotiation side, instead of addressing the tax policy which is going to this incentivize and a lot of those companies from being -- to disincentivise and those companies from being taken seriously. there was a thing where a company would sell to a british company or a canadian company

just to have a lower tax rate. unfortunately, what we may see with the 15% tax is off shoring of jobs. you can have in your own mind that i think corporations should pay this or that but you have to look at the competitive landscape. companies are going to be based where it is more tax efficient for them to be based. i am wary we are going to create a powerful incentive for companies to leave the u.s. host: democrat line, tammy. caller: good morning. i have a few points. if the u.s. government provides research on funding for all the drugs that are coming through and americans are still having to pay the higher part of that, i am not sure why that is ok. i was also wondering when it comes to become generic, are

companies able to change molecularly or an agreement there to keep the patent? also, is the u.s. one of the only countries that allows pharmaceuticals to advertise a commercial? think you. guest: a lot of great points. in terms of advertisement, i do not have a problem with advertisement. i think that can be good that if you have a new drug on a market that treats a disease that is otherwise untreated, you need patients to be aware that if you have these kinds of systems that you did not think you have, go ask your doctor. i think it is important to ask -- raise awareness for new treatments for new people. in terms of your point about the fact that a lot of the research is funded in academic centers like the by national institute for health and to pharmaceutical

companies than a fit from that? -- benefit from that? that is not necessarily a bad think. we have incredible innovation that comes from academia that leads to cures. the problem or economics of that sequence is not fairly distributed. the nih or the taxpayer does not get a lot of those benefits economically. the royalties are the go to the universities where they go to the pharmaceutical industry like the biotech industry. i think it is fair to say there should be more of an economic payoff for the taxpayer. i think there is more thinking we can do about what the nih's position should be about what the royalties they should receive our. it is absolutely true that negotiation, if you think about it from a moral standpoint, the

biotechnology innovation organization says it would be a terrible thing if the government got involved in prescription drugs. but the government has been involved all the way through in terms of supporting basic science and paying for the price of those drugs. there is a lot to say there. i think the most important thing is 90% of all drugs prescribed in the u.s. are generic, dirty drugs. if you go to your doctor and get a prescription, almost all of those drugs are less expensive than a six of sparkling water you get at the grocery store or soda you get at the grocery store. we are actually really good once a drug goes off patent at making that drug and expensive. the problem is 0.4% of the prescriptions lead to 50% of the cost. because companies are charging

american patients incredibly insane prices and that is where we have to do better. host: should influence -- insulin have been part of the inflation reduction act or at least a cap? guest: i think it was fine in the way it finally shook out. democrats were trying to make an argument that we should cap the co-pays that patients pay. that would have been a terrible mistake because if you force the insurers to say the patient can pay no more than $10 for their insulin, then what happens? then the manufacturers of insulin, in italy and denmark and france primarily, they say this is great. i can charge double wide charged before and the patient is still paying the same $10. who is paying the rest? the taxpayer.

the people who pay for their insurance premiums. all you do by capping co-pays is kind of a band-aid. it does not fix the problem and is pro inflationary because it gives a more powerful incentive for drug companies to raise their prices. what you have to do is have a more competitive system for the manufacturer of older insulin. insulin has been around for a hundred years so why is it so expensive? the reason is that the insulin patients get in the u.s. today are better than insulin from 100 is ago. these manufacturers keep tweaking it every year, kind of like the microprocessor in your computer. they make it a little better every year. just like you do not want to buy a 20 year old computer or a five-year-old phone, you do not want a 20-year-old or five-year-old version of insulin. but we still need to say the older version of insulin should

be on the market for the patients who need a low-cost alternative. so let's have that. there are really cool efforts in the philanthropy world to say let's manufacturer the lower costs of insulin and older insulin so people have the most affordable option possible. the challenge is insulin is hard to manufacture so it takes a lot of investment in trial and error to develop this that people are working on it which is great. host: one more call from bob, tennessee, republican line. caller: mr. roy, you are a very brilliant man. i am a republican and conservative on most things. but i do think in this country, there should be equality among poor people and the races. i am not a liberal but my friend went to medical school with you.

are you still a republican consultant? do you still consult republicans? what does your a quality mean in your foundation? you were sued for defamation, although you won. but my brother does not have a great opinion for you. he says that you are a brilliant man but you are using your brilliance in the wrong direction. host: ok, we will let our guests respond to all that. guest: i think i missed the part about who your brother was but tell them i said hello if he is someone i know. in terms of your questions about my political orientation or what ever, my views are that there are good people on both the democratic and republican parties want america to a better country and want to use the

traditional ideas of economic freedom and innovation and competition and pluralism to make america a country where everyone can succeed. my commitment is to work with everyone who advances the values from every party. historically, i have advised republican presidential candidates fast whether that happens in the future is up to the candidate. they need to decide whether or not they like my ideas. whether that is a democrat or republican, we work with people from both parties. the way it -- the way i look at it, is what the members of the parties stand for is changing all the time and my job is to have the northstar of equal opportunity for every american. that does not mean equal outcomes that means we should all have a fair shot at six as which is an idea -- shot at success which is an idea both

democrats and republicans have. host: there is a story the past couple days about the planned release of an omicron booster. this is not necessarily being tested on humans. is that a concern at this stage? guest: i am impressed by biovail and vaccines which are designed to treat the original or older strains of coronavirus or covid-19 but also some new variants like omicron. those vaccines have shown to be very effective in clinical trials. it is important to test vaccines in humans. it is obviously a lot harder now. the technical challenge is in country or the world were almost all of us have been vaccinated or exposed to covid and have some immunity, it is a lot harder now to say that if you give someone a vaccine, are they going to be infected with covid?

it is harder to know and harder to test positive. it is becoming harder to do trials and i'm sure the fda and manufacturers are doing their best to come up with a good scientific way to do that. we should have a law of confidence the fda is doing its job in the right way. i have criticized the fda on this program from being a bit too conservative or too cautious, creating higher costs, when it comes to clinical trials and making sure they are safe, the fda does a pretty good chop most of the time and i think we can have confidence in their work. host: -- declaring a public health emergency on monkeypox. is that a good movie? guest: no. there is a lot of fatigue from public health emergencies. i think they could have done a better job by saying this is something to be concerned about,

here are the risks. two x and y to minimize reduction. i think there are a lot of people in the public health committee who think that if less -- that unless you terrify people, they will not do things like wear and mask. the opposite is true. if you try to terrify people, it is like the boy who cried will sexual. host: avik roy from the foundation of research on equal opportunity. the president has the pennsylvania for a speech on crime and safety. he will travel on labor day as well to talk about that. that and other things you can talk about during public forum. (202) 748-8001 for republicans.

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tell your smart speaker to play c-span radio. c-span, powered by cable. lives, sunday on in-depth. uc berkeley's scholar stephen haley will be our guest to talk about leadership, ronald reagan's career and the conservative movement. he is the author of several books including two volumes in the age of reagan series. you change the course of conservative politics in america. join the conversation with her phone calls, -- your phone calls, texts and tweets. steven hayward life sunday at at noon eastern on c-span 2. announcer: washington journal continues. host: if you want to participate in open forum and text