Health Care
Don’t fund Medicare with higher taxes
President Joe Biden recently released his budget proposal for 2024. His plan pledges to extend Medicare’s solvency by at least 25 years “without cutting any benefits or raising costs for beneficiaries.” The president’s math doesn’t add up. His plan would burden taxpayers while leaving Medicare on the fast track to insolvency. Medicare’s Part A …
Bernie Doesn’t “Get” Healthcare Innovation
Next week, Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel will testify before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee on the price of his company’s COVID-19 vaccine. He’ll face an unfriendly audience. Committee Chairman Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., claims that companies like Moderna profited off COVID at Americans’ expense. He’s eager to “rein in the greed …
Time to drag hospital pricing out of the shadows
It’s been more than two years since a rule promulgated during the Trump administration requiring hospitals to disclose their prices took effect. Yet according to a new study, most hospitals aren’t complying. The analysis, published in January in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, found that just 19% of hospitals examined fully …
Britain Desperately Needs More Private Healthcare Options
Consultants at the British Medical Association are threatening to go on strike, citing pay cuts. They’d be joining a months-long series of walkouts by British medical staffers. Nurses with the country’s government-run National Health Service took to the picket lines in mid-December, January, and February. And while the British government plans to discuss …
How The Republican House Can Prevent Medicare Price Controls From Becoming Death Sentences
The Inflation Reduction Act’s (IRA) drug pricing provisions will severely curtail life-science research. The IRA vests the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services with the power to impose price controls on an ever-expanding list of drugs. The direct result will be that seniors today — as well as future generations …
How Congress can empower patients
Healthcare is back on the agenda in Washington. Last week, President Joe Biden released his budget proposal, which includes billions in new taxes and price controls on prescription drugs to help avert Medicare’s fiscal crisis and underwrite billions in health insurance subsidies. But in a divided Congress, it’s unlikely to go anywhere. Instead, lawmakers need …
PRI Sacramento Policy Conference: Improving the Quality of Life in Our Cities
Our podcast this week features a panel from PRI’s 5th Annual Ideas in Action Conference in Sacramento.
It’s Time For Medicare To Move Beyond Location, Location, Location
What’s the difference between getting an x-ray at the hospital and getting one at the doctor’s office? The former could cost a lot more than the latter. Medicare often reimburses hospitals more than it pays doctor’s offices for the same procedure. Hospitals claim these payment differentials are necessary because they are subject …
Medi-Cal Bad Idea for Golden State from the Start
Gov. Gavin Newsom, D-Calif., is now learning fortunes can change quickly in the Golden State. Less than a year ago, Newsom was celebrating a projected $100 billion budget surplus — a fiscal boon that prompted the governor and legislature to craft a budget exceeding $300 billion. Now, California faces a $22.5 billion …
$25 Minimum Wage for All “Healthcare CA Workers” Would Increase Hospital Closures
While those who do these jobs are hardworking and deserve to be paid well for doing such tough work, forcibly increasing the minimum wage to an unaffordable $25 per hour will cause increased financial strain on hospitals and healthcare facilities already struggling to keep doors open. In the current economic …
