There are three problems that we face as a nation: lack of universal access to medical care, poor quality medical care for many people, and the high cost of medical care. The last problem is the most intractable. I propose a solution below. [click to continue…]
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Interesting article over at MSN Money. Here's a taste:
Just where did Wall Street go wrong? It's popular to blame misaligned incentives, lack of regulation or just plain greed. . . . The truth is, sadly, more complex, but it boils down to this: Harvard Business School is to blame. Harvard Business School led the charge away from an approach to business centered on relationships and commerce and toward one rooted in markets and competition. . . . a Hobbesian view of business — nasty, brutish and every man for himself — and a rejection of the idea that ultimately we're all in this together. . . . In this worldview, "business ethics" is an oxymoron, not because of bad behavior but because ethics can't even exist apart from some notion of a "relationship" to something or someone else. Subordinating everything to shareholder value is, literally, anti-ethical.
I just want to say that I fully support blaming Harvard. I graduated from Brown. In fact, I think this should justify granting sole possession of the 2008 Ivy League football championship to Brown.
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Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and the House leadership have agreed upon a bill that they will bring to the floor of the House for consideration. Below the fold are links to the text and summaries of the bill, as well as a list of fourteen reforms that would be immediately implemented if it were to become law. [click to continue…]
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Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi announced last week that the legislation proposed in the House will close the "donut hole" (the coverage gap) in Medicare Part D prescription drug coverage. Details below. [click to continue…]
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Across the United States there are relatively few health insurers offering coverage in any particular geographic market. Following Justice Department guidelines, over 94 percent of U.S. markets for health insurance are "highly concentrated." In some states, there are only one or two insurers offering health insurance coverage. Despite this level of market concentration, however, the Congressional Budget Office has concluded that abolishing the antitrust exemption for health insurers would have little impact on either the federal budget or the cost of health care. [click to continue…]
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Akron Law will hold a special celebration on Wednesday, Nov. 4 in honor of the life of Professor Malina Coleman who passed away on Oct. 25. The celebration will be held at Quaker Square Inn at The University of Akron in Ballrooms B and C from 4:30 – 7:30 p.m. Professor Coleman had been a professor at Akron Law since 1989. More details about the celebration are available here.
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There is an excellent article by Ricardo Alonso-Zalvidar in today's Chicago Tribune describing the current political status of health care reform. The journalist quotes Senator Max Baucus (D-MT) as saying that there is "a sense of inevitability … that yes, we're going to pass health care reform." Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi are deciding what to include in the legislation that they will bring to the floor of their respective chambers. This posting summarizes the topics where there is broad agreement and the issues that are still being hashed out. [click to continue…]
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If Congress does nothing, physicians will experience a 20% reduction in the reimbursements that they receive from Medicare. The cause of this reduction is a federal law that establishes the "Sustainable Growth Rate" formula for changes in Medicare payments. [click to continue…]
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The University of Akron School of Law will host a lecture by leading tax authority Rick Grafmeyer, a 1982 graduate of Akron Law on Thursday, Nov. 5 at 5 p.m. in Room 152. The event is free and open to the public.
Grafmeyer is currently a partner with Capitol Tax Partners, Washington D.C.’s largest independent consulting firm specializing in tax legislative and regulatory matters. He served as chief tax advisor to Sen. John McCain during the 2008 Presidential election. From 1998 to 2000, he was deputy chief of staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT) and was responsible for major simplification study (three volumes), and separate studies on Tax Code penalty and disclosure provisions and tax-exempt organizations issued by JCT. [click to continue…]
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At 3:15 today Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) announced that the bill he will send to the floor of the Senate will include both the "public option" as contained in the Senate HELP Committee bill and the "co-ops" proposed in the Senate Finance Committee bill. The bill will also give individual states the power to opt out of the public option. He is sending the bill to the CBO for scoring.
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On October 7 the Supreme Court heard oral argument in the case of Salazar v. Buono, which involves the constitutionality of a cross that had been erected on public land. More below. [click to continue…]
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Below the fold are a link to a story about the President declaring the H1N1 epidemic to be a national emergency, and links to reports from the Centers for Disease Control about the epidemic. [click to continue…]
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