Unbiased Analysis of Today's Healthcare Issues
The USA Today reports on your government in action (“Subsidies…“): Flying round-trip from Lewistown, Mont., to Billings — also a two-hour-drive — costs $88 as well on Big Sky. The government cost: $1,343 per passenger. Just two people a day took the Lewistown-to-Billings flights on average in 2006, according to the DOT.
According to the N.Y. Times (“…Benefit Cut at 65 in Retiree Plans“) in 2001it is estimated that one-third of large employers and fewer than one-tenth of small employers offered health benefits to retirees. These numbers may trend towards zero in the near future after an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ruling. NPR’s Marketplace reports (“Employers…
The N.Y. Times has an interesting piece (“…Low-Cost, High Return Marketing“) on small business bloggers. It concludes that consultants are the mostly likely bloggers. Aliza Sherman Risdahl, author of The Everything Blogging Book, comments that âThey [consultants] are experts in their fields and are in the business of telling people what to do.â? A member…
On Monday, the California Assembly passed a bill that mandates health insurance for all California’s citizens. The government will provide subsidies households with incomes below 250 percent of the federal poverty level. Those earning between 250 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty level [FPL] would be able to deduct premium costs that exceed…
Merrill Goozner has a very interesting 4 part series on the pharmaceutical industry. Goozner talks of the inordinate amount of spending on pharmaceutical R&D yet notices a decrease in truly beneficial medicines. Pharmaceutical firms focus on trying to produce mass-market, blockbuster drugs for markets such as acid indigestion, headaches, and depression, but many of these…
The Sunday New York Times had an interesting article (“Disparately seeking a kidney“) on kidney transplantation. The author, a kidney recipient, suggests the following: “Altruism is a beautiful virtue, but it has fallen painfully short of its goal. We must be bold and experiment with offering prospective donors other incentives for giving, not necessarily payment…
The latest edition of the Cavalcade of Risk has been posted at American Consumer News.
Implementing electronic medical records (EMR) have been elevated to a top priority by healthcare policymakers. Using EMR, medical providers may be able to improve quality and better detect adverse events. One way to improve quality with EMR is chart abstraction. After a physician-patient encounter, the doctor can review the medical chart to see if he…
Development economists have long sought the answers as to why new innovations do or do not get implemented in developing countries. Giliches (1957) found that hybrid corn adoption has an S-shaped function over time. Other studies have found that an individual’s social network is the primary determinant of technology adoption. If your friends try out…
A very interesting article in the L.A. Times (“Defining government’s role in healthcare“) points out the following: Though many Americans may not realize it, government is already the dominant player in healthcare, with federal and state expenditures accounting for 47% of the projected $2.3 trillion the nation will spend this year. Indeed, many private insurers…