"Entitlement programs" is politicized as a term, certainly. "Cost disease", though... possibly in search for a new keyword?

> I'm referring to the phenomenon itself.

From your example, Elizabeth Warren and Tom Price are looking at the same appearances (phenomena) and deriving different "noumena".

Lots of downvotes here – any explanation? The GP uses the phrase "the phenomenon itself" referring to the Kantian term "Ding an sich", which (as applied to phenomena) is just a logical error...

I have nothing against being the guy who spends time pointing out small, or even irrelevant errors, but there is no error to correct. I think this is just a misinterpretation on your part, either stemming from not reading the article to understand what the author described as 'cost disease,' or perhaps you did not understand my use of quotation marks around cost disease in my original post.

I don't understand the hate for "entitlement programs"; it's a precise, common, useful category with no better suggestion offered.