Pitfalls of Medicaid Expansion
Medicaid expansion is an expensive endeavor that studies show does not provide better or more-affordable health care. Many of the expansion plans that Pennsylvania legislators are considering would use federal[...]
Category: Health Care
Featured · Health Care · Politics
Kathleen Sebelius’s Resignation Hands Republicans A Golden Opportunity
Not even the New York Times thinks Sebelius is leaving because she succeeded.
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Featured · Health Care · Politics · Regulation
Obamacare Shows America Suffers From A President Dangerously Disconnected From Reality
The doctor for Frank Alfisi told his daughter Amy, ‘You can thank Mr. Obama for this.’ The death by Obamacare has already begun.
Featured · Government · Health Care
Can Anyone Tell How Obamacare is Doing?
I don’t agree with the New Republic’s Jonathan Cohn very often, but in a recent article he said, “everybody should be cautious about making firm pronouncements about how the Affordable Care Act is doing.” Amen to that.
Of course, Mr. Cohn can’t help himself. He uses that reasonable statement as a launching pad for attacking, “…Cruz, Barrasso, and all the other hard-core Obamacare opponents on the right.” He just can’t imagine why these people might be skeptical of Administration claims about enrollment.
Featured · Government · Health Care
Zeke Goes Off the Rails
Ezekiel Emanuel, Rahm’s brother and one of the key ObamaCare advisors, has been on quite a roll lately. Consider some of the headlines just from the past few weeks or so. In every instance his message is that he knows better than you do what is good for you. He knows a better way to do insurance than you do, he knows that you don’t really need a choice of doctor or hospital, he knows that you don’t really need a doctor at all for most services, and he knows that “things are actually going well” for ObamaCare despite the fact that you and most Americans don’t like it.
Education · Featured · Government · Health Care
Twin ‘Botched’ Government Programs: Obamacare and Common Core
Who could forget about the botched ObamaCare roll out of last fall by the Obama administration when on September 26 Obama said, “… most of the stories you’ll hear about how ObamaCare just can’t work is just not based on facts. Every time they have predicted something not working, it’s worked.” But when people did start shopping for insurance coverage on October 1, Healthcare.gov crashed.
Featured · Government · Health Care
Mandates Never Work: The Case of Auto Insurance
Look, it is a fantasy that a group of legislators in Washington, DC or Albany New York can wave their magic wands and make everybody do what they want. A few years ago, I gave a speech to a group of state legislators in Albany shortly after New York enacted a new law prohibiting the use of hand-held cell phones while driving. In the taxi going from the airport to the venue I noticed that every single car on the highway was violating the 55 MPH speed limit, without exception, and at least a third of the drivers were chatting merrily on their hand-held phones.
NONE OF THIS EVER WORKS!
In Defense of the Uninsured
Health insurance is the most important thing on the face of the earth — more important than food, more important than clothing, or housing, or a job, and certainly more important than cell phones and cable TV, according to the President.
With this contemptuous attitude towards the people the elite is trying to “help” perhaps it is not surprising that the helpees are not behaving the way the helpers would like them to. Amy Goldstein writes in the Washington Post that “Health insurance marketplaces (are) signing up few uninsured Americans…”
Economics · Featured · Health Care · Internet/Telecom · Regulation
Governments Mandate Monopolies Then Complain About a Lack of Competition
The solution to government interference restricting innovation in the tech sector isn’t more government. But that’s exactly what governments proffer all the time.
New Rules Could Undermine Successful Medicare Part D Program
A new effort by the Obama Administration to change the Medicare Part D prescription drug program by imposing new rules on how the plans are set up and managed risk[...]
Why Bundled Payments Aren’t Working
The New England Journal of Medicine recently ran an article by Clay Ackerly, MD, and David Grabowski, PhD, calling for “Post-Acute Care Reform.”
The authors recommend a bundled payment system in which, “hospitals and post-acute care providers are paid for a fixed “bundle” of services around a hospital episode, including post-hospitalization care.” But, alas, there are “substantial regulatory and operational barriers” that prevent such a system from being instituted.
But before we think about the barriers, perhaps we should take a moment to consider what has been said so far.
The Buck Stops – Where?
Writing in the National Journal, Sam Baker tries his darnedest to minimize some of the effects of Obamacare.
Environment/Energy · Health Care · Legal Affairs · Liberty · Politics · Regulation
America’s Constitutional Crisis
It falls to the voters themselves to rescue the rule of law and the Constitution from the President Obama’s lawlessness.
What The Washington Post’s Factchecker Gets Wrong About Obamacare
The Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler is just such an arbiter, tossing out “Pinocchios” like Mardi Gras beads to all who offend his sense of rectitude. But from time to time, his rush to play “Gotcha” gets ahead of reason.
Health Care · Legal Affairs · Politics
Now Obama Really is Bypassing Congress
Manipulating large-scale legislative policies, duly enacted, around election schedules goes beyond the parameters of executive discretion.
Senator Charles Schumer Calls for Ban on Chemical Used in Bread that Obama’s FDA Says is Safe as Used
Subway’s move came as a result from pressure from Vani Hari, a blogger who calls herself “The Food Babe.”
Economics · Featured · Health Care · Politics
CBO Report Shows Obamacare’s Economic Damage
Obama’s implied tax and subsidy penalties for success are so high that it won’t be worth a lower-income person’s effort to try to climb up the income ladder.
Economics · Featured · Health Care · Politics
VID: Heartland’s Ben Domenech on MSNBC Talking Obamacare and Job Losses
Heartland Senior Fellow Benjamin Domenech was a guest Wednesday night on “All In with Chris Hayes” on MSNBC. Ben is rare among people who go on TV to talk: He actually endeavors to answer the questions he’s asked.
Education · Environment/Energy · Featured · Health Care · Liberty · Politics · Regulation
Heartland Institute Experts React to Obama’s State of the Union Address
Staff, fellows, and policy advisors at The Heartland Institute react to President Obama’s State of the Union speech.
The Next Wave of Obamacare Cancellations
Bad news: Employers are already starting to get the same cancellation letters that went to millions of people in the individual market late last year.
Heartland on YouTube
Readable Links- Who Owns the Land?
- The terrible economic burden of occupational licensing
- Competition, disruptive innovation, and men's razors
- Althouse: The Clinton White House "conspiracy commerce memo" warned, in 1995, that "THE INTERNET... allows an extraordinary amount of unregulated data and information to be located in one area and available to all."
- The Epic Hypocrisy of Tom Steyer
- Competition, Rent-Seeking, and High-Frequency Trading
- Popular Technology.net: 1350+ Peer-Reviewed Papers Supporting Skeptic Arguments Against ACC/AGW Alarm
