Sally C. Pipes

Health Care

New PRI Brief: Patent Taxes Threaten America’s Most Productive Engine of Growth

SACRAMENTO. (December 22, 2025) — The free-market Pacific Research Institute today released an issue brief finding that the Trump administration’s proposed 50% tax on patent revenue from inventions created using federal grants would disincentivize universities from expending the time, money, and effort to engage in federally-funded research. “Universities respond to ...
Blog

How do price controls damage innovation?

What role do intellectual property laws play in encouraging innovation? They are absolutely essential. IP protections like patents reward those who succeed in creating new medicines and ushering them through the regulatory approval process. They do this by guaranteeing that the IP rights holder behind a new drug will have ...
Uncategorized

A Republican healthcare package remains within reach

The House is expected to vote this week on healthcare reform legislation. The upcoming action comes on the heels of two failed votes in the Senate: one a Democratic bill that would’ve extended COVID-19-era enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies for exchange coverage and the other a Republican bill that would ...
Commentary

Chaos At The FDA Benefits America’s Rivals—At The Expense Of America’s Patients

Chaos has become the norm at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. And it’s putting American patients, not to mention our country’s world-leading life sciences sector, at risk. Earlier this year, roughly 3,500 FDA employees were laid off. The agency’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, which oversees prescription and ...
Commentary

Democrats Can’t End Private-Sector Drug Innovation Fast Enough

In November, a group of Democrats in the U.S. House made clear that they’ll sacrifice medical innovation for lower drug prices if they ever reclaim Congress. Patients today and tomorrow will be the losers in that trade. Read the op-ed here.
Commentary

The real story behind Trump’s GLP-1 price cut: Markets still rule

President Donald Trump just announced deals with drugmakers Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk that will yield lower prices for GLP-1 weight-loss drugs dispensed through Medicare and Medicaid. Both firms have also agreed to sell the drugs at lower prices on Trump’s yet-to-be-developed online marketplace for prescription drugs, TrumpRx. Lilly and ...
Commentary

GAO Provides Yet More Evidence for Why Enhanced Obamacare Subsidies Must Expire

Defrauding the government through Obamacare’s insurance exchanges is shockingly easy, per a new government report. The study found that federal insurance subsidies were granted for 90 percent of the fake exchange accounts set up as part of a Government Accountability Office investigation — at a cost of more than $10,000 ...
Commentary

Despite Dems’ protests, affordable health plans are about to multiply

Obamacare premiums are climbing yet again during open enrollment. But there’s also some good news for cost-conscious shoppers ― a new way to secure affordable coverage without forgoing access to care. This year, many people can buy low-cost “catastrophic” health plans for the very first time. Combine one of these ...
Blog

How did the US become the world’s center of pharmaceutical innovation?

What kinds of policies helped the US surpass Great Britain to become the world’s center of pharmaceutical innovation? I think it was a combination of shrewd reforms on the part of the United States, and self-destructive reforms on the part of Europe and other developed nations. In the 1970s, Europe ...
Commentary

Trade Policy Is The Right Way To Fight Foreign Freeloading

Last week, the United States and the United Kingdom announced a trade deal that will require Britain’s National Health Service to pay more for novel prescription drugs in exchange for a reprieve of at least three years from tariffs on its pharmaceutical exports. It’s a perfect example of how the ...
Health Care

New PRI Brief: Patent Taxes Threaten America’s Most Productive Engine of Growth

SACRAMENTO. (December 22, 2025) — The free-market Pacific Research Institute today released an issue brief finding that the Trump administration’s proposed 50% tax on patent revenue from inventions created using federal grants would disincentivize universities from expending the time, money, and effort to engage in federally-funded research. “Universities respond to ...
Blog

How do price controls damage innovation?

What role do intellectual property laws play in encouraging innovation? They are absolutely essential. IP protections like patents reward those who succeed in creating new medicines and ushering them through the regulatory approval process. They do this by guaranteeing that the IP rights holder behind a new drug will have ...
Uncategorized

A Republican healthcare package remains within reach

The House is expected to vote this week on healthcare reform legislation. The upcoming action comes on the heels of two failed votes in the Senate: one a Democratic bill that would’ve extended COVID-19-era enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies for exchange coverage and the other a Republican bill that would ...
Commentary

Chaos At The FDA Benefits America’s Rivals—At The Expense Of America’s Patients

Chaos has become the norm at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. And it’s putting American patients, not to mention our country’s world-leading life sciences sector, at risk. Earlier this year, roughly 3,500 FDA employees were laid off. The agency’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, which oversees prescription and ...
Commentary

Democrats Can’t End Private-Sector Drug Innovation Fast Enough

In November, a group of Democrats in the U.S. House made clear that they’ll sacrifice medical innovation for lower drug prices if they ever reclaim Congress. Patients today and tomorrow will be the losers in that trade. Read the op-ed here.
Commentary

The real story behind Trump’s GLP-1 price cut: Markets still rule

President Donald Trump just announced deals with drugmakers Eli Lilly and Novo Nordisk that will yield lower prices for GLP-1 weight-loss drugs dispensed through Medicare and Medicaid. Both firms have also agreed to sell the drugs at lower prices on Trump’s yet-to-be-developed online marketplace for prescription drugs, TrumpRx. Lilly and ...
Commentary

GAO Provides Yet More Evidence for Why Enhanced Obamacare Subsidies Must Expire

Defrauding the government through Obamacare’s insurance exchanges is shockingly easy, per a new government report. The study found that federal insurance subsidies were granted for 90 percent of the fake exchange accounts set up as part of a Government Accountability Office investigation — at a cost of more than $10,000 ...
Commentary

Despite Dems’ protests, affordable health plans are about to multiply

Obamacare premiums are climbing yet again during open enrollment. But there’s also some good news for cost-conscious shoppers ― a new way to secure affordable coverage without forgoing access to care. This year, many people can buy low-cost “catastrophic” health plans for the very first time. Combine one of these ...
Blog

How did the US become the world’s center of pharmaceutical innovation?

What kinds of policies helped the US surpass Great Britain to become the world’s center of pharmaceutical innovation? I think it was a combination of shrewd reforms on the part of the United States, and self-destructive reforms on the part of Europe and other developed nations. In the 1970s, Europe ...
Commentary

Trade Policy Is The Right Way To Fight Foreign Freeloading

Last week, the United States and the United Kingdom announced a trade deal that will require Britain’s National Health Service to pay more for novel prescription drugs in exchange for a reprieve of at least three years from tariffs on its pharmaceutical exports. It’s a perfect example of how the ...
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