Wayne Winegarden

Blog

Learn How Drug Price Controls Hurt Patients

Big Pharma Is Not Gouging Americans nor Driving Up Healthcare Costs

Whether it is Sanders vilifying pharmaceutical companies or Trump’s emphasis on imposing price controls, they both allege that drug spending is a primary driver of the nation’s rising healthcare costs. Even a cursory look at the data demonstrates their focus is misplaced. Let’s start with the national health expenditure data ...
Blog

Spending Watch

California’s FY2025-26 Budget Failed to Address the State’s Long-term Financial Risks

California’s FY2025-26 Budget Failed to Address the State’s Long-term Financial Risks Wayne Winegarden October 2025 Politicians too often assume that California’s fiscal health is synonymous with the state of its annual budget. When revenue growth is strong, the state is allegedly in a sound fiscal position. It is only when ...
Drug Prices

NEW BRIEF: New California Medi-Cal Restrictions Will Hurt Patients; Competition Key to Affordable, High-Quality Health Care

SACRAMENTO – As California prepares to restrict access to proven private health insurers for dual eligible Medicare and Medi-Cal patients, the Center for Medical Economics and Innovation at the Pacific Research Institute – the nonpartisan, California-based, free market think tank – today released a new brief showing that expanding competition—not ...
Commentary

The Administration Risks Drug Shortages That Will Cost Patients Dearly

Judged by its actions, the Trump Administration supports drug shortages. Clearly, this is not the President’s stated goal, but it is the inevitable result of his policies including his proposed drug tariffs and most favored nation (MFN) policies. Read the op-ed here.
Blog

The fast food minimum wage hike continues to kill jobs

Governor Newsom Protests Too Much – the Minimum Wage Increase Did Destroy Jobs

As the New York Post reported, Newsom’s deputy director of communications Tara Gallegos disputed the findings of the piece, pointing out to Fox News Digital that the research paper was linked to the Hoover Institution, a public policy think tank she claimed has published “false or misleading information” about California’s ...
Blog

Read part 3 of a series on drug pricing

Regulations, Not Anticompetitive Actions, Are Obstructing Drug Competition

The flaws driving up costs across the broader health care landscape are also driving up the costs for innovative drugs. After all, pharmaceuticals are an integral component used in combination with the broader healthcare system. As a result, spending on medicines both influences and is influenced by the spending on ...
Blog

The U.S. Drug System Strikes a Reasonable Balance Between Incentivizing Innovation and Promoting Competition

The government explicitly grants innovators temporary market exclusivity to provide an opportunity for groundbreaking pharmaceutical companies to recover the costs of capital associated with developing novel treatments. This was one of the express purposes of past federal reform legislation, such as the Hatch-Waxman Act signed in 1984 and the Biologics ...
Blog

Read part 1 of a 3 part series on drug pricing

Conspiracies Aside, Drug Company Profits Are Average

Recently, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) held its first of three listening sessions on the pharmaceutical market. The goal was to discuss reforms that will improve drug affordability by increasing “generic and biosimilar availability” and promoting “competition”. Achieving these goals is essential. The flaw of the first listening session is ...
Blog

Spending Watch

An Irresponsible FY2025-26 Budget All but Ensures Future Fiscal Crises

An Irresponsible FY2025-26 Budget All but Ensures Future Fiscal Crises Wayne Winegarden July 2025 Another fiscal year, another lost opportunity. In a June 2025 Spending Watch analysis, I lamented that Newsom was relying on gimmicks to close the current $12 billion budget deficit. The final budget the governor and legislative ...
Blog

The 340B Discounts Hospitals Receive Will Often Exceed Total Drug Prices in Europe

Table 1: PBM Fees and Rebates Can Exceed International Prescription Medicine Prices by As Much As 900% I previously highlighted how estimated rebates and fees PBMs receive for 10 commonly used brand medicines far exceed the total prices of those medicines in eight OECD countries (see Table 1). For example, ...
Blog

Learn How Drug Price Controls Hurt Patients

Big Pharma Is Not Gouging Americans nor Driving Up Healthcare Costs

Whether it is Sanders vilifying pharmaceutical companies or Trump’s emphasis on imposing price controls, they both allege that drug spending is a primary driver of the nation’s rising healthcare costs. Even a cursory look at the data demonstrates their focus is misplaced. Let’s start with the national health expenditure data ...
Blog

Spending Watch

California’s FY2025-26 Budget Failed to Address the State’s Long-term Financial Risks

California’s FY2025-26 Budget Failed to Address the State’s Long-term Financial Risks Wayne Winegarden October 2025 Politicians too often assume that California’s fiscal health is synonymous with the state of its annual budget. When revenue growth is strong, the state is allegedly in a sound fiscal position. It is only when ...
Drug Prices

NEW BRIEF: New California Medi-Cal Restrictions Will Hurt Patients; Competition Key to Affordable, High-Quality Health Care

SACRAMENTO – As California prepares to restrict access to proven private health insurers for dual eligible Medicare and Medi-Cal patients, the Center for Medical Economics and Innovation at the Pacific Research Institute – the nonpartisan, California-based, free market think tank – today released a new brief showing that expanding competition—not ...
Commentary

The Administration Risks Drug Shortages That Will Cost Patients Dearly

Judged by its actions, the Trump Administration supports drug shortages. Clearly, this is not the President’s stated goal, but it is the inevitable result of his policies including his proposed drug tariffs and most favored nation (MFN) policies. Read the op-ed here.
Blog

The fast food minimum wage hike continues to kill jobs

Governor Newsom Protests Too Much – the Minimum Wage Increase Did Destroy Jobs

As the New York Post reported, Newsom’s deputy director of communications Tara Gallegos disputed the findings of the piece, pointing out to Fox News Digital that the research paper was linked to the Hoover Institution, a public policy think tank she claimed has published “false or misleading information” about California’s ...
Blog

Read part 3 of a series on drug pricing

Regulations, Not Anticompetitive Actions, Are Obstructing Drug Competition

The flaws driving up costs across the broader health care landscape are also driving up the costs for innovative drugs. After all, pharmaceuticals are an integral component used in combination with the broader healthcare system. As a result, spending on medicines both influences and is influenced by the spending on ...
Blog

The U.S. Drug System Strikes a Reasonable Balance Between Incentivizing Innovation and Promoting Competition

The government explicitly grants innovators temporary market exclusivity to provide an opportunity for groundbreaking pharmaceutical companies to recover the costs of capital associated with developing novel treatments. This was one of the express purposes of past federal reform legislation, such as the Hatch-Waxman Act signed in 1984 and the Biologics ...
Blog

Read part 1 of a 3 part series on drug pricing

Conspiracies Aside, Drug Company Profits Are Average

Recently, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) held its first of three listening sessions on the pharmaceutical market. The goal was to discuss reforms that will improve drug affordability by increasing “generic and biosimilar availability” and promoting “competition”. Achieving these goals is essential. The flaw of the first listening session is ...
Blog

Spending Watch

An Irresponsible FY2025-26 Budget All but Ensures Future Fiscal Crises

An Irresponsible FY2025-26 Budget All but Ensures Future Fiscal Crises Wayne Winegarden July 2025 Another fiscal year, another lost opportunity. In a June 2025 Spending Watch analysis, I lamented that Newsom was relying on gimmicks to close the current $12 billion budget deficit. The final budget the governor and legislative ...
Blog

The 340B Discounts Hospitals Receive Will Often Exceed Total Drug Prices in Europe

Table 1: PBM Fees and Rebates Can Exceed International Prescription Medicine Prices by As Much As 900% I previously highlighted how estimated rebates and fees PBMs receive for 10 commonly used brand medicines far exceed the total prices of those medicines in eight OECD countries (see Table 1). For example, ...
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