Health Affairs

One of the most contentious issues in drafting health reform legislation was the tax treatment of health care expenses.  From modifying the tax exclusion for employer-provided health coverage to imposing new fees on medical treatments and products, resistance to changing health tax policy underscored the immense difficulty of enacting reforms without a broad political consensus.... Read the rest of this entry »

For the past two years, debate as to whether health reform would result in rationing has underscored the contradiction between the health care Americans would like to have and what we’re actually willing to pay for it.  One may note that the terms budgeting and rationing are synonymous – especially today in an era of... Read the rest of this entry »

In our current political environment, wins are more important than policy successes, and for too long that has driven a juvenile mindset which engages in “magical thinking” in which beliefs trump facts, and benefits can be achieved without costs. So it’s no surprise that Republican leadership recognized that opposition to the individual mandate would be... Read the rest of this entry »

On July 28 the Obama Administration surprised many in the health sector by withdrawing a pending Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) final “breach notification” rule governing when consumers must be informed of illicit access or use of their medical records. With this exceptional action, the Administration now has a critical opportunity to correct... Read the rest of this entry »