Category Archives: Health Care
On the CLASS Act and Fiscal Honesty
Via Reihan Salam, James Capretta reacts to the Administration’s decision to improve the CLASS Act, the long-term care insurance program that was passed as a part of health care reform: Stunningly, the Obama administration, after spending months defending CLASS’s virtues, … Continue reading
Filed under Economics, Health Care
Putting the Cost of Health Care Reform in Perspective
There are, believe it or not, plenty of interesting tidbits from CBO’s latest Budget and Economic Outlook. Below, for example, is CBO’s projection of the budgetary costs of different federal medical entitlements. Notice the budgetary impact of the subsidies and … Continue reading
Filed under Health Care
How We’re Paying for Health Care Reform
Greg Mankiw takes another crack at health care reform pedagogy: I have a plan to reduce the budget deficit. The essence of the plan is the federal government writing me a check for $1 billion. The plan will be financed … Continue reading
Filed under Economics, Health Care
Centrists v. "Centrists"
So here I was yesterday, ready to agree with Ross Douthat’s first post-election broadside against "centrists" Evan Bayh, Charlie Crist, and Arlen Specter: All three were frequently praised for their moderation by credulous reporters, and their political difficulties were constantly … Continue reading
Filed under Health Care, Politics
Ministry of Self-Parody: Reason Edition
The title of this blog post at Reason: The Hudson River Tunnel: Victim of Obamacare? I think at some point, I’m going to blame my awful fantasy football season on Obamacare. As an aside, at work today I mentioned to … Continue reading
Filed under Economics, Health Care
The Over-Optimism of the Medicare Trustee’s Spending Estimates
If you have a passion for medical finance (or just a thing for self-flagellation), you’ve already curled up with the Medicare Trustee’s annual report for 2010 [PDF]. Inside, you’ll find this data, cited approvingly by Paul Krugman as evidence of … Continue reading
Filed under Economics, Health Care
On Medicare, Double-Counting, and Intragovernmental Debt
Megan McCardle is exacerbated at the accusation that the government is double-counting Medicare cuts passed as part of health care reform, because it using them both to extend the solvency of the Medicare Part A trust fund and pay for … Continue reading
Filed under Economics, Health Care
Even-keeled Uncertainty
National Review blogger Reihan Salam dismisses the CBO’s findings last week that health care reform, if unrepealed, closes the nation’s long-term fiscsl gap by a not-insignificant 2 percentage points of GDP, remarking “Of course, the Sustainable Growth Rate would have … Continue reading
Filed under Economics, Health Care
The "Docfix Gimmick" Gimmick
e21 has a staff editorial up today about the jobs bill before Congress and the "doc fix" provision overriding a planned 21% reduction in Medicare physician payments that was supposed to take effect this year. Some of the observations about … Continue reading
Filed under Health Care
FTFY Charles Krauthammer, PART 1
Charles Krauthammer’s latest is a watershed moment in our fiscal discourse: it’s not the first column on health care reform (not by a long shot), and not the first column on the VAT (ditto), but it’s the first column to … Continue reading
Filed under Economics, Health Care, Politics
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