MedWorm provides a medical RSS filtering service. Over 6000 RSS medical sources are combined and output via different filters. This feed contains the latest medical blog items that have been tagged with 'health care legislation'. Sat, 03 Sep 2011 02:40:16 +0100 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3378457&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FpvbkCO_jQVY%2F By Michael F. CannonDavid Goldhill has done it again. You may recall his article, “How American Health Care Killed My Father,” from the September 2009 issue of The Atlantic. Now, at HuffingtonPost, he comments on the health care legislation that may soon face a final vote (of some sort) in the House: [C]ontinuing our Party’s almost unquestioned conflation of health insurance with health care, the central feature of the proposed “reform” is further extension of our flawed insurance-based system…[D]espite the Administration’s recent heated rhetoric, most of the entrenched health industry interests are quietly or openly in favor of this bill. Should the bill become law, I suspect we will look back at it as an industry bailout… How…can Dem... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3378457 Wed, 17 Mar 2010 20:05:40 +0100 3378457 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3354303&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F8hO8LijGrCU%2F By Michael F. CannonWhat does it say that the American polity has consistently rejected a wholesale government takeover of health care for 100 years? What does it say that public opinion has been consistently against the Democrats’ health care takeover since July 2009? What does it say that Democrats are having this much difficulty enacting their health care legislation despite unified Democratic rule?  Despite large supermajorities in both chambers of Congress, including a once-filibuster-proof Senate majority (see more below)?  Despite an opportunistic change in Massachusetts law that provided that crucial 60th vote at a crucial moment?  Despite a popular and charismatic president? What does it say that 38 House Democrats voted against the president’s health plan? What does it say... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3354303 Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:40:33 +0100 3354303 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3326961&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FVDed4mPfv20%2F By Michael F. CannonIn a letter to congressional leaders, President Obama wrote of his openness to including Republican proposals in his health care legislation. Dropping a few Republican ideas into a government takeover of health care is like sterilizing the needle before a lethal injection: a nice thought, but the ultimate outcome is the same. Two of the four Republican ideas – federal grants to states that adopt medical malpractice liability reforms, and ratcheting upward Medicare’s physician-price controls – would increase government spending. The president’s health savings accounts (HSAs) proposal would merely loosen the noose around consumer-directed health plans. Undercover investigations in Medicare and Medicaid are likely to be as unsuccessful as past efforts to comba... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3326961 Wed, 03 Mar 2010 16:04:19 +0100 3326961 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3298293&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FZHT934nOUDw%2F By Michael F. CannonIn a recent paper, I showed that the health care legislation passed by the House and Senate would impose punitive implicit tax rates on low- and middle-income workers.  Those bills would also result in higher health insurance premiums over time because they would create large financial incentives for healthy people to drop coverage and only purchase it when they become sick. The health care proposal that President Obama released yesterday essentially splits the difference on most areas of disagreement between the two bills.  But a preliminary analysis shows that ObamaCare 3.0 would make these perverse incentives even worse.  Families of four earning $22,000 under the Senate bill (100 percent of the federal poverty level) or $30,000 under the House bill or the Obama p... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3298293 Tue, 23 Feb 2010 13:49:17 +0100 3298293 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3185314&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FX9dAbJFhoIE%2F By Tad DeHavenMost people would agree with Chris Edwards that the federal tax code is insanely complicated. The IRS Commissioner doesn’t do his own taxes, the Treasury secretary and other Washington policy experts haven’t paid what is owed, and the already overwhelmed IRS would be given an expanded role under the Democrat’s health care legislation. A key problem is that the social engineers on Capitol Hill have run amok. Recently, they have been enamored with home-buying tax credits, and CNN.com notes how it is further overwhelming the IRS bureaucracy: On Thursday, CNNMoney revealed that buyers who purchased their properties after Nov. 6 were unable to claim the refund because the Internal Revenue Service had yet to release a new form and instructions. But on Friday, the IRS finally ... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3185314 Tue, 19 Jan 2010 14:14:45 +0100 3185314 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3171884&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2F1ypg4QUiWbQ%2F By Chris Moody A real stimulus: To create jobs, repeal the corporate-income tax. As if times weren’t hard enough: The individual mandate on health insurance would impose high implicit taxes on low-wage workers. For more on this, read the new Cato study on burdens the health care legislation will place on the poor. Hot off the press: New issue of Regulation magazine looks at lessons from the financial crisis and property rights. Even though the government is running massive deficits, interest rates and inflation are low. So, what’s the problem? Podcast: “Bernanke’s Conceit” featuring Mark A. Calabria. (Source: Cato-at-liberty) Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3171884 Wed, 13 Jan 2010 19:23:48 +0100 3171884 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3171889&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FqfHgYHyCgPg%2F By Michael F. CannonIn a new study titled, “Obama’s Prescription for Low-Wage Workers: High Implicit Taxes, Higher Premiums,” I show that the House and Senate health care bills would impose implicit tax rates on low-wage workers that exceed 100 percent.  Here’s the executive summary: House and Senate Democrats have produced health care legislation whose mandates, subsidies, tax penalties, and health insurance regulations would penalize work and reward Americans who refuse to purchase health insurance. As a result, the legislation could trap many Americans in low-wage jobs and cause even higher health-insurance premiums, government spending, and taxes than are envisioned in the legislation. Those mandates and subsidies would impose effective marginal tax rates on lo... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3171889 Wed, 13 Jan 2010 16:31:52 +0100 3171889 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3142518&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FV6vBZ0jwCog%2F By Michael F. CannonIn 2009, congressional Democrats fashioned their health care legislation out of public view.  That enabled them to avoid some public intra-party spats; to hide maybe 60 percent of the cost of the legislation and otherwise game the Congressional Budget Office’s scoring rules; to deny the public enough time time to learn about how the legislation would work; and to cram the legislation through the Senate the day before Christmas.  Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s backroom negotiations are rightfully infamous. Now comes word that, rather than follow the usual conference procedure that we all learned about as children, House and Senate Democrats will conduct informal negotiations — behind closed doors, all by themselves, with no C-SPAN cameras —... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3142518 Tue, 05 Jan 2010 02:09:58 +0100 3142518 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=3100781&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FbmiVeQhPtSY%2F By Alan ReynoldsDuring the runaway inflations of 1974 and 1979, Presidents Ford and Carter suggested that inflation was caused by the profligacy of American households. President Ford’s infamous “Whip Inflation Now” speech, for example, said, “Here is what we must do, what each and every one of you can do: To help increase food and lower prices, grow more and waste less; to help save scarce fuel in the energy crisis, drive less, heat less.” Much of the recent discussion of health care costs likewise treats this as a problem caused by a demonic private insurance industry, and therefore requiring such “reforms” as expanding Medicaid to the non-poor and Medicare to the non-old. The facts are quite different, as shown in “The Evolution of Medical Spending Risk” by Jonathan Gr... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=3100781 Thu, 17 Dec 2009 17:52:23 +0100 3100781 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2828180&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FHFkWs3qR1Xo%2F Will Americans get “quality time” with proposed health care legislation before it passes? Some say no: The Senate Finance Committee recently turned back an effort to put Chairman Max Baucus’ bill online for 72 hours before the committee’s vote. The Committee is on the wrong side of history. Transparency shifts power away from the center, so it’s favored by those out of power. It’s no wonder that Republican representative John Culberson, a member of the minority party, is putting H.R. 3400 (a significant health care bill) online for comment, using a tool called SharedBook. Transparency won’t be a gift from government. It is something we have to take. That’s why I think the action lies in private efforts like OpenCongress, GovTrack, and (... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2828180 Thu, 24 Sep 2009 15:43:28 +0100 2828180 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2778387&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2Fa49WOEq6Lxg%2F Thomas Friedman’s New York Times column today would be astonishing in its incoherence if only Friedman hadn’t long ago sapped us of our ability to be astonished by his incoherence. Like many capital-’d’ Democrats, Friedman has soured on democracy for failing to deliver on his policy wish list. Watching both the health care and climate/energy debates in Congress, it is hard not to draw the following conclusion: There is only one thing worse than one-party autocracy, and that is one-party democracy, which is what we have in America today. Why does Friedman say the United States has one-party democracy? Because the Republican Party is effectively opposing the Democratic Party’s agenda! Not even kidding. Get this: The fact is, on both the energy/climate legislatio... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2778387 Wed, 09 Sep 2009 18:11:09 +0100 2778387 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2610890&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=36438&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeedproxy.google.com%2F%7Er%2FCato-at-liberty%2F%7E3%2FpdgGefsqbyw%2F Reading the New York Times’s coverage of a Senate committee’s recent vote on health care legislation, I was struck by the following statement from Sen. Dodd: If you don’t have health insurance, this bill is for you,” said Senator Christopher J. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut, who presided over more than three weeks of grueling committee sessions. “It stops insurance companies from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions. It guarantees that you’ll be able to find an insurance plan that works for you, including a public health insurance option if you want it.” The bill would also help people who have insurance, Mr. Dodd said, because “it eliminates annual and lifetime caps on coverage and ensures that your out-of-pocket costs will never exceed your ability to... Cato-at-liberty blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2610890 Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:05:02 +0100 2610890 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=2206163&cid=t_185099_82_f&fid=38206&url=http%3A%2F%2Falowe.medbrains.net%2F2009%2F02%2F22%2Fdear-legislator%2F Following on from my last article on how medicine just isn’t anymore fun, the following letter is my bid to start the conversation on some important issues. I welcome all thoughts, insights and guidance. Dear Legislator: As the “other insurance business,” we wanted to show you our appreciation for not regulating us. Thanks for enabling us to continue raising premiums and decreasing payments to those who deliver health care so we can continue to please our shareholders and allow our executives to live the high lifestyle to which they have become accustomed. It has been a great ride for us, both for-profit and not-for-profit alike. Sure, you could have capped our profits and forced us to help pay for the uninsured or create useful products for Americans. You could have required us ... Anthony Lowe : Anesthesiologist blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=2206163 Sun, 22 Feb 2009 14:59:49 +0100 2206163 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1918050&cid=t_185099_87_f&fid=35052&url=http%3A%2F%2Ffeeds.feedburner.com%2F%7Er%2FWomensBioethicsBlog%2F%7E3%2F435330290%2Fyo-vitter-knock-it-off.html So here's something I feel fairly outraged about, just 'cause it seems like unfair piling on: because of an anti-abortion amendment Senator David Vitter (R-Louisiana) attached to the reauthorization of the American Indian Healthcare Improvement Act, the Act is being held up yet again.Some people think the writing has been on the wall for some time about this (you can read more about the history of this mess at Indian Country Today), but the reality is that the state of health care for Native American people on and off the reservations in this country is a national shame ... and to tie the fate of health services to the perennial third rail of politics is a travesty.Hat tip to the Kaiser Health Disparities Report (which does a swell job getting you your weekly dose of reality and high blood... Women's Bioethics Blog blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1918050 Wed, 29 Oct 2008 01:39:24 +0100 1918050 http://www.medworm.com/index.php?rid=1477808&cid=t_185099_125_f&fid=34820&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dentalblogs.com%2Farchives%2Fadministrator%2Fdentistry-and-government-unite%2F Members of the American Dental Education Association met with nearly 100 congressional offices to promote oral healthcare awareness and research funding. The event marked AADR-ADEA Advocacy Day. The ADEA works as a coalition to address modern issues in dentistry. The organization provides mainstream media to colleges, universities, and other institutions that can affect the dental industry and profession. Also this month, the ADA-backed oral health initiative bill was introduced by Sen. Cardin (D-Md.); it is co-sponsored by Sen. Collins (R-Maine). The bill is intended to improve oral healthcare access through assessment and revisions to allocation of the Department of Health and Human Services resources. An advisory panel will be comprised of dentists, oral health specialists, and Medicaid... dental blog for dentists about dentistry blogs http://www.medworm.com/rss/comments.php?id=1477808 Fri, 30 May 2008 12:11:35 +0100 1477808