California
Health Care
Repeal and Replace, But With What?
Key Points: Republicans in Congress appear to be solidly committed to repealing ObamaCare. Republicans’ last attempt at reforming health insurance, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), did not solve the problems of portability and coverage for pre-existing conditions, the stated goals of the Act. The official ...
Business & Economics
Pension crater much deeper
SACRAMENTO – A new report from Stanford University’s well-respected economic policy institute has revealed that those of us who have been warning about California’s severely underfunded public employee retirement systems have, quite frankly, been wrong. We have been understating the scope of the problem. Pension critics, myself included, have been ...
Business & Economics
Vallejo Goes for Broke
Can bankruptcy save California’s cities from staggering pension obligations? As California cities and counties struggle to fulfill the generous pay and pension commitments that they made to public employees during flush economic times, some politicians have taken comfort in a usually forbidding word: bankruptcy. Top officials in Los Angeles and ...
Business & Economics
A bone to pick with Bartlett on federal spending
Reps. Jeb Hensarling and Mike Pence recently called for a constitutional amendment limiting federal spending “to one-fifth of the economy.” Bruce Bartlett, a former official in the George H.W. Bush administration, promptly denounced the idea as “dopey,” one “terrible… on so many levels that it is hard to know where ...
California
Double Jeopardy? Californians Are Already Protected from Health Insurance Cancellations
The health “reform” recently signed by President Obama may be expensive and over-regulated but its consumer protection parts are popular. They also turn out to be redundant, even though it’s hard to criticize a law that prevents a health insurer from dropping a beneficiary after someone falls ill. Indeed, H.R. ...
Health Care
What the Congressional Budget Office Doesn’t Score: More Than $6.5 Billion Annual State Revenue at Risk from Federal Health “Reform”
Key Points State revenues in 2008 included an estimated $6.5 billion in revenues from premium taxes levied on health insurance. The federal takeover of health insurance will lure 15 million more people into Medicaid, and nine million into federally licensed “exchanges” from state-regulated health insurance. The “reform” will reduce states’ ...
Business & Economics
Vallejo’s Painful Lessons in Municipal Bankruptcy
Two years after going broke, the California city still isn’t free of its crushing pension obligations. In 2008, Vallejo, Calif., was nearly broke. Faced with falling tax revenues, rising pension costs, and unmovable public-employee unions, the city was unable to pay its bills and declared bankruptcy. Now, as it prepares ...
California
California stands to gain most from health bill
The stakes are high for Californians when it comes to the health care overhaul, mainly because the coverage problems in this vast state are so large. With a new UCLA study estimating that more than 8 million Californians, or nearly 25 percent of the population, lack health coverage, many health ...
Health Care
What CBO Doesn’t Score: Over $6.5 Billion Annual State Revenue At Risk
Now that Congress has reached the “end of the beginning” of the federal take-over of people’s access to medical services, please allow me to point out a cost that Congress has ignored. According the the CBO’s score of the Senate health “reform,” H.R. 3590, the bill would insure 31 million ...
Commentary
Federal health takeover threatens Hawaii budget
Hawaii’s Congressional delegation is committed to a massive reorganization of health insurance by the federal government. This mission is about to collide with state budgets, causing much collateral damage. Most people remain unaware that health-insurance premiums contribute to states’ tax revenues. On average, states tax private health insurance 2 percent ...
Repeal and Replace, But With What?
Key Points: Republicans in Congress appear to be solidly committed to repealing ObamaCare. Republicans’ last attempt at reforming health insurance, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), did not solve the problems of portability and coverage for pre-existing conditions, the stated goals of the Act. The official ...
Pension crater much deeper
SACRAMENTO – A new report from Stanford University’s well-respected economic policy institute has revealed that those of us who have been warning about California’s severely underfunded public employee retirement systems have, quite frankly, been wrong. We have been understating the scope of the problem. Pension critics, myself included, have been ...
Vallejo Goes for Broke
Can bankruptcy save California’s cities from staggering pension obligations? As California cities and counties struggle to fulfill the generous pay and pension commitments that they made to public employees during flush economic times, some politicians have taken comfort in a usually forbidding word: bankruptcy. Top officials in Los Angeles and ...
A bone to pick with Bartlett on federal spending
Reps. Jeb Hensarling and Mike Pence recently called for a constitutional amendment limiting federal spending “to one-fifth of the economy.” Bruce Bartlett, a former official in the George H.W. Bush administration, promptly denounced the idea as “dopey,” one “terrible… on so many levels that it is hard to know where ...
Double Jeopardy? Californians Are Already Protected from Health Insurance Cancellations
The health “reform” recently signed by President Obama may be expensive and over-regulated but its consumer protection parts are popular. They also turn out to be redundant, even though it’s hard to criticize a law that prevents a health insurer from dropping a beneficiary after someone falls ill. Indeed, H.R. ...
What the Congressional Budget Office Doesn’t Score: More Than $6.5 Billion Annual State Revenue at Risk from Federal Health “Reform”
Key Points State revenues in 2008 included an estimated $6.5 billion in revenues from premium taxes levied on health insurance. The federal takeover of health insurance will lure 15 million more people into Medicaid, and nine million into federally licensed “exchanges” from state-regulated health insurance. The “reform” will reduce states’ ...
Vallejo’s Painful Lessons in Municipal Bankruptcy
Two years after going broke, the California city still isn’t free of its crushing pension obligations. In 2008, Vallejo, Calif., was nearly broke. Faced with falling tax revenues, rising pension costs, and unmovable public-employee unions, the city was unable to pay its bills and declared bankruptcy. Now, as it prepares ...
California stands to gain most from health bill
The stakes are high for Californians when it comes to the health care overhaul, mainly because the coverage problems in this vast state are so large. With a new UCLA study estimating that more than 8 million Californians, or nearly 25 percent of the population, lack health coverage, many health ...
What CBO Doesn’t Score: Over $6.5 Billion Annual State Revenue At Risk
Now that Congress has reached the “end of the beginning” of the federal take-over of people’s access to medical services, please allow me to point out a cost that Congress has ignored. According the the CBO’s score of the Senate health “reform,” H.R. 3590, the bill would insure 31 million ...
Federal health takeover threatens Hawaii budget
Hawaii’s Congressional delegation is committed to a massive reorganization of health insurance by the federal government. This mission is about to collide with state budgets, causing much collateral damage. Most people remain unaware that health-insurance premiums contribute to states’ tax revenues. On average, states tax private health insurance 2 percent ...
