Ramesh, I’ll see your Ed Crane and raise you a Milton Friedman, who signed a letter that said, “If [reimportation] succeeds, American consumers would get the short-term windfall of lower prices, but they would end up unnecessarily suffering and living shorter lives — because promising new therapies would be delayed or not even developed.” It’s a complex issue certainly, as are all cases of [economic jargon] declining marginal costs [/economic jargon] but re-importation at best amounts to importing other countries’ price controls, which is hardly a free-market solution. My CEI colleagues discussed other options for R&D cost recovery, which is the crux of the problem, in this 2004 working paper.

As for whether a stance for or against reimportation will by itself swing someone’s vote for or against any candidate, you are certainly right. However, I think it’s not unreasonable to suggest that a number of contrarian stances by a candidate may add up to provoke a vote-changing judgment. ‘Many a mickle maks a muckle,’ as they say in my part of the world.