Medicare
Commentary
Medicare Reimbursement Cap Called Unlikely to Stop Fraud
Responding to serious Medicare fraud and corruption in Florida’s Miami-Dade County, where five doctors from one clinic were found guilty of racketeering over the past three years, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is proposing a nationwide cap on Medicare reimbursements for treating in-home patients with chronic ailments. The ...
Commentary
Annual Medicare Fraud: $60 Billion; Annual Profits of Top Ten Insurance Companies: $8 billion
Well, let’s see…. Last year, the profits of the ten largest insurance companies in America were just over $8 billion — combined. No single insurance company made even five percent of what Medicare reportedly loses in fraud. While we’re making comparisons, in its real first ten years (2014-23), the Senate ...
Commentary
Doctors Seven Times More Satisfied with Payments from Private Insurance as Medicare
Funded by the Robert Wood Johnson (RWJ) Foundation, the survey’s results were promoted with a different headline than you see above. “Poll finds most doctors support public option,” said National Public Radio (NPR); “73% of doctors favor public option,” said Salon’s Steve Klingman. These headlines were encouraged by the RWJ ...
Commentary
The Medicare tsunami
In a recent news conference, President Obama said: “The biggest driving force behind our federal deficit is the skyrocketing cost of Medicare and Medicaid. So let me be clear: If we do not control these costs, we will not be able to control our deficits.” He is absolutely right. The ...
Commentary
N.Y. Congressman Pushes ‘Medicare-for-all’ on ‘Morning Joe’
‘Morning Joe’ fails to note problems in claim there is no need for private insurers. While the uproar over a government-run public option continues in Washington, D.C. and around the country, one Democratic congressman is pushing for an even more drastic “takeover” of health care. Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., told ...
Commentary
Even If It’s Not a ‘Death Panel,’ It Doesn’t Belong in Medicare
But even if we don’t go off the deep end with the “death panel” rhetoric, there’s still a fundamental problem with this, which gets to the core of why health insurance is so expensive: There is no reason for a health insurer to pay for such counselling. It’s a service ...
Commentary
Costs of Medicare/Medicaid Have Outpaced Other Health Costs by 1/3 Since 1970
Ezra Klein has posted a blog criticizing the claim (made by Bill Kristol on the Daily Show Monday night) that the costs of government-run health care have greatly outpaced other health costs. But Klein is mistaken. Advocates of ObamaCare like to rely on studies comparing the cost-increases of government-run care ...
Health Care
Medicaid’s Costs, Like Medicare’s, Have Risen Far More Than the Costs of Private Health Care
As the congressional debate heats up over President Obama’s proposed “public option” and his proposed expansion of Medicaid, the debate largely centers on the question of controlling costs. The president claims that more government control would make health care more affordable. The empirical evidence, however, confirms that more government control ...
Commentary
Medicare: The Problem and the Solution?
What has the most potential to mire the United States in long-term debt? According to White House Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag, the answer is Medicare and Medicaid. Orszag writes that every other federal program’s effect on future deficits and debt is “swamped” by the effects of ...
Commentary
Public Option To Cut Health Costs? Medicare’s Record Says Dream On
“First, the rising cost of health care must be brought down.” That’s what President Obama recently declared when outlining the basic principles of his health care plan. His supporters have echoed his emphasis. The New York Times writes that, when it comes to health policy, “The president’s main focus is ...
Medicare Reimbursement Cap Called Unlikely to Stop Fraud
Responding to serious Medicare fraud and corruption in Florida’s Miami-Dade County, where five doctors from one clinic were found guilty of racketeering over the past three years, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is proposing a nationwide cap on Medicare reimbursements for treating in-home patients with chronic ailments. The ...
Annual Medicare Fraud: $60 Billion; Annual Profits of Top Ten Insurance Companies: $8 billion
Well, let’s see…. Last year, the profits of the ten largest insurance companies in America were just over $8 billion — combined. No single insurance company made even five percent of what Medicare reportedly loses in fraud. While we’re making comparisons, in its real first ten years (2014-23), the Senate ...
Doctors Seven Times More Satisfied with Payments from Private Insurance as Medicare
Funded by the Robert Wood Johnson (RWJ) Foundation, the survey’s results were promoted with a different headline than you see above. “Poll finds most doctors support public option,” said National Public Radio (NPR); “73% of doctors favor public option,” said Salon’s Steve Klingman. These headlines were encouraged by the RWJ ...
The Medicare tsunami
In a recent news conference, President Obama said: “The biggest driving force behind our federal deficit is the skyrocketing cost of Medicare and Medicaid. So let me be clear: If we do not control these costs, we will not be able to control our deficits.” He is absolutely right. The ...
N.Y. Congressman Pushes ‘Medicare-for-all’ on ‘Morning Joe’
‘Morning Joe’ fails to note problems in claim there is no need for private insurers. While the uproar over a government-run public option continues in Washington, D.C. and around the country, one Democratic congressman is pushing for an even more drastic “takeover” of health care. Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., told ...
Even If It’s Not a ‘Death Panel,’ It Doesn’t Belong in Medicare
But even if we don’t go off the deep end with the “death panel” rhetoric, there’s still a fundamental problem with this, which gets to the core of why health insurance is so expensive: There is no reason for a health insurer to pay for such counselling. It’s a service ...
Costs of Medicare/Medicaid Have Outpaced Other Health Costs by 1/3 Since 1970
Ezra Klein has posted a blog criticizing the claim (made by Bill Kristol on the Daily Show Monday night) that the costs of government-run health care have greatly outpaced other health costs. But Klein is mistaken. Advocates of ObamaCare like to rely on studies comparing the cost-increases of government-run care ...
Medicaid’s Costs, Like Medicare’s, Have Risen Far More Than the Costs of Private Health Care
As the congressional debate heats up over President Obama’s proposed “public option” and his proposed expansion of Medicaid, the debate largely centers on the question of controlling costs. The president claims that more government control would make health care more affordable. The empirical evidence, however, confirms that more government control ...
Medicare: The Problem and the Solution?
What has the most potential to mire the United States in long-term debt? According to White House Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag, the answer is Medicare and Medicaid. Orszag writes that every other federal program’s effect on future deficits and debt is “swamped” by the effects of ...
Public Option To Cut Health Costs? Medicare’s Record Says Dream On
“First, the rising cost of health care must be brought down.” That’s what President Obama recently declared when outlining the basic principles of his health care plan. His supporters have echoed his emphasis. The New York Times writes that, when it comes to health policy, “The president’s main focus is ...
