Health Care
Commentary
Even Blue Cross/Blue Shield Likes Consumer-Driven Health Care
The latest presentation from the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association (BCBSA) continues the steady drumbeat of positive data about the take-up of consumer-driven health plans (CDHP), which has reached (fingers crossed) its tipping point. It’s an outstanding presentation, prepared by Maureen Sullivan, senior VP at BCBSA (with whom I’m not ...
Commentary
Sec. Leavitt to Greedy Governors: Medicaid Is Not A Bottomless Well
One of the “benefits” of the way we finance Medicare (and Social Security), at least, is that the law requires offically appointed actuaries to report annually on the fiscal status of the program, via the Medicare Trustees Report. Each year, the horror of Medicare’s unfunded liability grows starker and closer. ...
Commentary
Drug Importation is a ‘Reform’ We Can Do Without
Last month, both presidential candidates announced that they were reconsidering their long-standing support for the importation of prescription drugs from abroad. Their timing couldn’t have been better. Days later, Belgian authorities seized over two million counterfeit drugs on their way from India to Africa. This incident serves as a chilling ...
Commentary
“Universal” Health Care in Hawaii: A Quarter Century of Failure
Today, the world learned that Hawaii is dropping its plan for “universal” health care for kids, Keiki Care, just seven months after it launched. (For some insightful commentary, see here.) But wait a minute… Hawaii already imposed “universal” health care in 1974! Or maybe not, I guess. In my analysis ...
California
Nickel & Dimed in San Francisco Health Care
Despite a (possibly short-term) victory in court, San Francisco’s Health Access Program faces an uphill struggle to provide so-called “universal” health care to San Franciscans. SF HAP, a.k.a. “Healthy San Francisco”, is the name given to the City’s tax hike on small businesses to fund it’s public health bureaucracy. Apparently, ...
Commentary
Port-Wine Stains: A Particularly Idiotic Statement on State Benefit Mandates
Me, that’s who. Alabama came in first place in the second edition of the Index of Health Ownership. I was so pleased that I asked Michael Ciamarra of the Alabama Policy Institute to collaborate with me on an op-ed for placement in local newspapers. As a result, I managed to ...
Commentary
Importation is a national security issue
John McCain and Barack Obama have long been proponents of lifting the ban on foreign drug importation. Both claim the move would reduce the nation’s healthcare costs by giving Americans access to cheap pills from abroad. Now, according to recent announcements from their advisors, they are both reconsidering their support ...
Commentary
Stanford’s Student Family Health Plan: A Case Study in Fragmentation
For those of us who advocate eliminating the tax-prejudice that gives our employers, instead of ourselves, a subsidy for buying our health care, the collapse of family health coverage for students at Stanford and other California universities presents quite a challenging case study. Stanford demands that its students have health ...
Commentary
The Stealth Mental Health Parity Act: An Attack on Innovation and Choice in Health Care
If anyone wonders why the government should not decide which benefits health plans must provide, let him observe the troubled birth of the “Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008.” Wellstone-Domenici had languished in Congress for a full 16 years and got passed ...
Business & Economics
If We Can’t Get Price Transparency, Let’s Try Calorie Transparency
Who knows why Governor Schwarzenegger signed SB-1420, a silly law that requires chain restaurants (a.k.a. fast-food joints) to post calorie-counts of their burgers, fries, and shakes on the menu-boards. Maybe sign-makers lobbied for it? I doubt it: Governor Schwarzenegger is a huge supporter of the nanny-state when it comes to ...
Even Blue Cross/Blue Shield Likes Consumer-Driven Health Care
The latest presentation from the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association (BCBSA) continues the steady drumbeat of positive data about the take-up of consumer-driven health plans (CDHP), which has reached (fingers crossed) its tipping point. It’s an outstanding presentation, prepared by Maureen Sullivan, senior VP at BCBSA (with whom I’m not ...
Sec. Leavitt to Greedy Governors: Medicaid Is Not A Bottomless Well
One of the “benefits” of the way we finance Medicare (and Social Security), at least, is that the law requires offically appointed actuaries to report annually on the fiscal status of the program, via the Medicare Trustees Report. Each year, the horror of Medicare’s unfunded liability grows starker and closer. ...
Drug Importation is a ‘Reform’ We Can Do Without
Last month, both presidential candidates announced that they were reconsidering their long-standing support for the importation of prescription drugs from abroad. Their timing couldn’t have been better. Days later, Belgian authorities seized over two million counterfeit drugs on their way from India to Africa. This incident serves as a chilling ...
“Universal” Health Care in Hawaii: A Quarter Century of Failure
Today, the world learned that Hawaii is dropping its plan for “universal” health care for kids, Keiki Care, just seven months after it launched. (For some insightful commentary, see here.) But wait a minute… Hawaii already imposed “universal” health care in 1974! Or maybe not, I guess. In my analysis ...
Nickel & Dimed in San Francisco Health Care
Despite a (possibly short-term) victory in court, San Francisco’s Health Access Program faces an uphill struggle to provide so-called “universal” health care to San Franciscans. SF HAP, a.k.a. “Healthy San Francisco”, is the name given to the City’s tax hike on small businesses to fund it’s public health bureaucracy. Apparently, ...
Port-Wine Stains: A Particularly Idiotic Statement on State Benefit Mandates
Me, that’s who. Alabama came in first place in the second edition of the Index of Health Ownership. I was so pleased that I asked Michael Ciamarra of the Alabama Policy Institute to collaborate with me on an op-ed for placement in local newspapers. As a result, I managed to ...
Importation is a national security issue
John McCain and Barack Obama have long been proponents of lifting the ban on foreign drug importation. Both claim the move would reduce the nation’s healthcare costs by giving Americans access to cheap pills from abroad. Now, according to recent announcements from their advisors, they are both reconsidering their support ...
Stanford’s Student Family Health Plan: A Case Study in Fragmentation
For those of us who advocate eliminating the tax-prejudice that gives our employers, instead of ourselves, a subsidy for buying our health care, the collapse of family health coverage for students at Stanford and other California universities presents quite a challenging case study. Stanford demands that its students have health ...
The Stealth Mental Health Parity Act: An Attack on Innovation and Choice in Health Care
If anyone wonders why the government should not decide which benefits health plans must provide, let him observe the troubled birth of the “Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008.” Wellstone-Domenici had languished in Congress for a full 16 years and got passed ...
If We Can’t Get Price Transparency, Let’s Try Calorie Transparency
Who knows why Governor Schwarzenegger signed SB-1420, a silly law that requires chain restaurants (a.k.a. fast-food joints) to post calorie-counts of their burgers, fries, and shakes on the menu-boards. Maybe sign-makers lobbied for it? I doubt it: Governor Schwarzenegger is a huge supporter of the nanny-state when it comes to ...
