News
Fiscal Times | Senate to Vote to Repeal Small Part of Health Law
Congress is poised to send the White House its first rollback of last year's health care law, a bipartisan repeal of a burdensome tax reporting requirement that's widely unpopular with businesses. Even President Barack Obama is eager to see it gone.
NationalJournal | Left Takes Aim at Ryan's Health Voucher Proposal
Health care advocacy groups spent Monday spoiling for a fight over expected proposals to privatize Medicare and convert Medicaid into a state-owned and operated program for the poor.
Econ Comments
Cato Institute | Ryan Budget: A Huge Opportunity to Improve Health Care
The budget should restrain Medicare spending by giving enrollees fixed vouchers they can use to purchase any private health plan of their choice. Poor and sick enrollees should get larger vouchers, but the average voucher amount should grow only at the overall rate of inflation.
Blogs
Atlantic: Megan Mcardle | The GOP Health Care Plan: A Diference in Kind, not Degree
So the Republicans have finally released what I think we can all agree is a plan for Medicare and Medicaid (though of course, I there remains the possibility that some of the people who have been complaining that the GOP "doesn't have a plan" may now retreat to saying that this is "not a real plan"). The plan is very real--though obviously, not to the liking of many. It essentially voucherizes Medicare (with larger vouchers for the poor and sick), while transforming Medicaid into block grants.
Marginal Revolution | Choice-based Medicare cost controls
Let’s say it’s 2027 and I’ve just turned 65. I fill out a Medicare application on-line and opt for a plan with superior heart coverage (my father died of a heart attack), not too much knee coverage and physical therapy (my job doesn’t require heavy lifting), no cancer heroics (my mother turned them down and I wish to follow her example), and lots of long-term disability.
Pajamas media | Smothering Medical Innovation
If we want to maintain our innovative mojo, the one thing we cannot do is continue down the road we are on of socializing the whole system.
Atlantic: Megan Mcardle | Health Care Law Still Really Unpopular
I took a casual gander at the health care poll numbers this morning, and what I saw surprised even me. Obamacare not only hasn't gotten more popular, but is now showing a record gap between favorables and unfavorables:
Cato Institute | Medicare and Medicaid Reform
An essay on Medicare explains the program’s numerous shortcomings and an essay on Medicaid examines that program’s flaws. Suggested reforms in the essays are similar to reforms in Rep. Ryan's proposal, including converting Medicaid to a block-grant program.
NRO: The Corner | The Ryan Plan Doesn’t Privatize Medicare
In fact, while this reform is a great start, the plan continues the Washington tradition of extending open-ended promises on Medicare without paying for them (even though the cost is much lower). Also, this may be nitpicking on my part, but under this plan consumers will still be bound to a list of guaranteed coverage options chosen by the government
Heritage Foundation | New Report Shows Sec. Sebelius is Overstepping Her Authority
Secretary Sebelius has repeatedly asserted that CLASS is unsustainable. She has advocated repeal if CLASS can’t be reformed. It appears likely that the Obama Administration knew the program was fiscally unsustainable before Obamacare became law, and included it in the health care law only as a mechanism to reduce the price tag of the bill. Now, Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius is asserting power that Congress did not grant her in a futile attempt to remake the program into something sustainable.
Reports
Heritage Foundation | Health Care Exchanges: Obamacare Isn't the Answer
States shouldn’t try to “shoehorn” a conservative, market-based exchange into the Obamacare architecture; it isn’t a viable strategy either practically or politically. States should instead advance separate conservative, patient-centered, market-based health care reforms that offer Americans concrete examples of a positive, alternative vision to Obamacare and reinforce congressional efforts to repeal it.
