Commentary
Commentary
Rhode Island Seeks Caps on Medicaid, Will Shift Costs to Emergency Room Patients
In response to an ongoing state budget crisis, Rhode Island Gov. Don Carcieri (R) has requested the federal government relax its strict Medicaid regulations in exchange for caps on state spending and federal contributions to the program. The state’s plan is to cap Medicaid spending at 23 percent of the ...
Commentary
San Francisco Employer Mandate Can Go Forward, Circuit Court Rules
San Francisco’s “pay-or-play” health care mandate will be allowed to continue operating following a ruling by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decreeing the program does not violate federal law governing employee benefit plans. The controversial program, known as Healthy San Francisco, requires every business in San Francisco County ...
Business & Economics
Upper Midwest Is Enjoying Sudden Renaissance of Economic Freedom
In news that has come as something of a surprise to economy watchers, the South is no longer the U.S. region offering the most promising trend toward economic freedom. The new champ is the Upper Midwest—places such as South Dakota, which tops the latest U.S. Economic Freedom Index, issued by ...
Commentary
Jewish Groups Lobby for Federal School Choice Bill
Forty-four years after the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a new rights movement is gathering steam as ethnic groups are increasingly joining forces to press for school choice. Jewish groups have taken a prominent role in the effort. The Civil Rights Act of Equal Educational Opportunity (CRA ...
Commentary
Government Care Isn’t Promising
Health care reform proposals generally fall into two camps: Those that rely on government to expand access and hold prices down, and those that rely on market competition to lower prices and expand consumer choice. Proponents of government-heavy reform believe that because the health care problem itself is massive and ...
Commentary
Medicare Benefits Fall Short of Employer-Provided Health Care Plans
Employer-provided health plans provide more generous benefits to seniors than Medicare does, according to an analysis conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Lincolnshire, Illinois-based Hewitt Associates. The study compared the traditional fee-for-service Medicare benefit package, including the prescription drug benefit, with typical large employer-provided health plans. The study found ...
Commentary
Medical Licensing Impedes Quality, Affordability of Care
Medical licensing is ineffective and inefficient, and patients would be better served by relying on brand recognition when choosing their doctors, writes Shirley Svorny in a new report for the Cato Institute. “In health care, we haven’t used brand names because people have been trusting licensure,” Svorny told Health Care ...
Commentary
California Passes Laws to Remove Questionable Teachers from Classrooms
California classrooms may soon be safer thanks to a pair of new laws signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R). The bills are designed to close loopholes that allowed teachers accused or even convicted of sexual misconduct or drug crimes to work in public school classrooms. The measures were spurred by ...
Commentary
Bush’s Final Medicaid Reform Increases Patient Responsibility
The Bush Administration’s (or the Bush “regime’s”, if you prefer) theme in Medicaid reform has been to give states more flexibility in how they operate their Medicaid programs, despite the federal government paying over half the cost. In its (likely) final hurrah, the Administration recently published Medicaid rules allowing states ...
California
House Committee Considers Tax Breaks for Individual Health Insurance
Health Care News (Heartland Institute), December 1, 2008 Members of the U.S. House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee are debating the merits of enacting tax breaks for individuals who buy private insurance, which would put them on equal tax footing with employers who purchase insurance for their employees. The committee ...
Rhode Island Seeks Caps on Medicaid, Will Shift Costs to Emergency Room Patients
In response to an ongoing state budget crisis, Rhode Island Gov. Don Carcieri (R) has requested the federal government relax its strict Medicaid regulations in exchange for caps on state spending and federal contributions to the program. The state’s plan is to cap Medicaid spending at 23 percent of the ...
San Francisco Employer Mandate Can Go Forward, Circuit Court Rules
San Francisco’s “pay-or-play” health care mandate will be allowed to continue operating following a ruling by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decreeing the program does not violate federal law governing employee benefit plans. The controversial program, known as Healthy San Francisco, requires every business in San Francisco County ...
Upper Midwest Is Enjoying Sudden Renaissance of Economic Freedom
In news that has come as something of a surprise to economy watchers, the South is no longer the U.S. region offering the most promising trend toward economic freedom. The new champ is the Upper Midwest—places such as South Dakota, which tops the latest U.S. Economic Freedom Index, issued by ...
Jewish Groups Lobby for Federal School Choice Bill
Forty-four years after the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a new rights movement is gathering steam as ethnic groups are increasingly joining forces to press for school choice. Jewish groups have taken a prominent role in the effort. The Civil Rights Act of Equal Educational Opportunity (CRA ...
Government Care Isn’t Promising
Health care reform proposals generally fall into two camps: Those that rely on government to expand access and hold prices down, and those that rely on market competition to lower prices and expand consumer choice. Proponents of government-heavy reform believe that because the health care problem itself is massive and ...
Medicare Benefits Fall Short of Employer-Provided Health Care Plans
Employer-provided health plans provide more generous benefits to seniors than Medicare does, according to an analysis conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Lincolnshire, Illinois-based Hewitt Associates. The study compared the traditional fee-for-service Medicare benefit package, including the prescription drug benefit, with typical large employer-provided health plans. The study found ...
Medical Licensing Impedes Quality, Affordability of Care
Medical licensing is ineffective and inefficient, and patients would be better served by relying on brand recognition when choosing their doctors, writes Shirley Svorny in a new report for the Cato Institute. “In health care, we haven’t used brand names because people have been trusting licensure,” Svorny told Health Care ...
California Passes Laws to Remove Questionable Teachers from Classrooms
California classrooms may soon be safer thanks to a pair of new laws signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R). The bills are designed to close loopholes that allowed teachers accused or even convicted of sexual misconduct or drug crimes to work in public school classrooms. The measures were spurred by ...
Bush’s Final Medicaid Reform Increases Patient Responsibility
The Bush Administration’s (or the Bush “regime’s”, if you prefer) theme in Medicaid reform has been to give states more flexibility in how they operate their Medicaid programs, despite the federal government paying over half the cost. In its (likely) final hurrah, the Administration recently published Medicaid rules allowing states ...
House Committee Considers Tax Breaks for Individual Health Insurance
Health Care News (Heartland Institute), December 1, 2008 Members of the U.S. House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee are debating the merits of enacting tax breaks for individuals who buy private insurance, which would put them on equal tax footing with employers who purchase insurance for their employees. The committee ...
