Both the new House health reform bill and the Senate Finance Committee bill, despite their best efforts, have to impose some taxes on some taxpayers; they cannot get all of a trillion dollars of subsidies for insurance out of Medicare.  But they differ on what and whom to tax: the House proposes to tax well-off [...]

HR 3962, the Affordable Health Care for Americans Act, hit the House floor with a thud Thursday morning at 1990 pages, almost double the size of the bill we last saw before the Energy and Commerce hearings at the end of July.  The bill incorporates, of course, amendments from the House jurisdictional committees, but also [...]

On October 12 America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP) released a commissioned report by Price Waterhouse Cooper (PWC), “Potential Impact of Health Reform on the Cost of Private Health Insurance Coverage.”   The study reported that health care reform as envisioned by the Senate Finance Committee would raise the cost of private health insurance by 23 percent [...]

Narrative Matters recently brought together 80 writers, journalists, and academics to celebrate the Tenth Anniversary of Narrative Matters.  There was much to celebrate: over 150 Narratives published in Health Affairs that covered a spectrum of human stories set in the increasingly institutionalized health care system.  We came to celebrate the power of stories and storytelling in the [...]

On Tuesday October 13, Darius Lakdawalla was awarded Research!America’s 2009 Garfield Economic Impact Award for his paper “U.S. Pharmaceutical Policy In A Global Marketplace,” published in Health Affairs, December 16, 2008. 
Lakdawalla is director of research, Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics, and associate professor, School of Policy, Planning and Development, at the University of Southern [...]

Insurance exchanges, or “Gateways” as they are called in the Senate HELP bill, are a key element in all of the congressional health reform proposals, as well as the proposal outlined by President Obama in his speech to Congress. The exchange is not some new heavy-handed government regulatory body. Rather, the purpose of the exchange [...]

In 2001, the U.S. Surgeon General issued a warning that this country was facing an “obesity epidemic.” Since that time, there have been public policy responses from all levels of government. Yesterday Health Affairs released three studies about municipal responses, one from Los Angeles and two from New York.
• Zoning For Health? The Year-Old Ban On [...]

Editor’s Note: In addition to S. Ward Casscells, M.D. and Hiliary Critchley (photos and bios above), coauthors of this post include Thomas Amoroso, M.D., of the Quincy Medical Center; James Tyll of James Tyll Consulting, LLC; and John Zogby of Zogby International, Inc. The authors are also grateful for analytical advice contributed by Grace Ren [...]

Uwe Reinhardt’s assessment of President Obama’s address to Congress on health reform tops the list of most-read Health Affairs Blog posts for September.  Additional comment on all posts is always welcome. 

Grading The President’s Health Care Speech
by Uwe Reinhardt
Health Affairs Briefing: Bending The Cost Curve In Health Spending
by Chris Fleming
Regional Payment And Delivery Reforms: Critical To [...]

The Senate Finance Committee is now considering a proposal that would impose an aggregate tax of $6.7 billion dollars per year on “any U.S. health insurance provider,” in proportion to market share, whether for profit or not for profit, but not on employers who “self fund” their employees’ coverage.
About 160 million Americans have private health [...]

The complex health care overhaul underway in Congress would require nearly all Americans to have health insurance – a provision known as “individual responsibility” or an “individual mandate.” Supporters warn other reforms are not possible without this requirement.  But many opponents say such a mandate is unaffordable, and unacceptable in a free society. 
A new Health [...]

There has been much debate about whether the various health reform bills being debated in Congress contain enough measures to reform the health care delivery system and slow the rate of growth in health care spending. Speaking at the Sept. 9 briefing held to release Health Affairs’ Sept-Oct issue, a thematic volume titled “Bending The [...]

In recent days, Republican leaders on Capitol Hill have taken up the argument that the Democratic health reform bills represent a “government takeover” of the health care system.  These claims misrepresent the substantive content of the bills, since the approach of the main committee bills is to extend employer-sponsored, private insurance.  But this rhetorical exaggeration [...]

As anyone who has been observing recent goings-on in the Senate Finance Committee knows, moving toward universal coverage is no easy matter. No sooner did Finance Chair Max Baucus (D-MT) release his long-awaited Chairman’s mark of health reform legislation than he was pushed to increase the subsidies available to low- and middle-income Americans to purchase [...]

The biggest flashpoint in the ongoing debate over the future of the U.S. health system is whether Congress should change the balance of power that now favors the private health insurance industry. Opponents of the idea argue that a public health insurance plan competing with private insurers would lead to inferior health care, harm providers, [...]

After decades of teaching, I view everything around me as a final exam and assign it letter grades.
Naturally, I graded President Barack Obama’s speech as well. The overall grade is A–, a highly respectable grade at Princeton, although there is variation around this overall average for the different themes in the speech.
The elegance and force [...]

The president’s speech to Congress struck important political notes.  It also included three tantalizing opportunities for adding some aspects of health care reform to what was becoming simply health insurance reform. 
Delaying Implementation of the Exchange
The most obvious new, and possibly controversial, point in the speech was the four-year delay in implementing the Insurance Exchange.  This [...]

After the August congressional recess, health care reform was on life support.  In a speech of remarkable force and eloquence on Wednesday night to a congressional joint session, President Obama made clear that he would use every resource available to him to assure that health reform survives to become law.
The August recess had left hopes [...]

The need to “bend the curve” of rising health care costs is certain. Less certain is the nation’s political will to take on that difficult task.
That conundrum emerged today at a Washington, D.C. briefing sponsored by Health Affairs. The briefing, held to launch the journal’s Sept-Oct issue, a thematic volume titled “Bending The Cost Curve,” [...]

If the growth rate in U.S. health care spending continues at current levels, a vastly greater share of personal income and economic resources will be devoted to health care, according to a new analysis in the September/October issue of Health Affairs. And even if that growth rate could be slowed sharply — to a pace [...]