Health Reform Hub Issues

Issues :: Health Costs

Family Health Premiums Rise 3 Percent to $13,770 in 2010, But Workers' Share Jumps 14 Percent as Firms Shift Cost Burden
Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research & Educational Trust, 09/02/10

Workers on average are paying nearly $4,000 this year toward the cost of family health coverage - an increase of 14 percent, or $482, above what they paid last year, according to the benchmark 2010 Employer Health Benefits Survey released today by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research & Educational Trust (HRET). The jump occurred even though the total premiums for family coverage, including what employers themselves contribute, rose a modest 3 percent to $13,770 on average in 2010, the survey found.  In contrast, the amount employers contribute for family coverage did not increase.  Preferred Provider Organizations (PPOs) continue to dominate the employer market, enrolling 58 percent of covered workers.  Average PPO family premiums topped $14,000 annually in 2010. Since 2005, workers’ contributions to premiums have gone up 47 percent, while overall premiums rose 27 percent, wages increased 18 percent, and inflation rose 12 percent.  Read more...

Federal Spending Rises a Record 16%
Michael A. Fletcher and Carol Morello

The Washington Post, 9/01/10

Federal domestic spending increased a record 16 percent, to $3.2 trillion, in 2009, the Census Bureau reported Tuesday, largely because of a boost in aid to the unemployed and the huge economic stimulus package enacted to rescue the sinking economy. Overall, the largest chunk of federal spending - about 46 percent of the $3.2 trillion - went to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, entitlement programs that are projected to swell as the population ages. Read more...

White House Mispricing the Cost of Repeal

American Action Forum, 08/31/10

The claim that repealing the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act would cost $455 billion is built on the accounting tricks that the White House used to proclaim in March that the bill would reduce the deficit. Both spurious White House claims, regarding the cost of repeal and the cost of implementing the law, cherry pick Congressional Budget Office (CBO) data to present cases to the American people that are built on a foundation of sand.  Read more...

Even With Malpractice Insurance, Doctors Opt for Expensive, Defensive Medicine
Manoj Jain

The Washington Post, 08/31/10

Most malpractice suits turn out to be against doctors who were not at fault. Of every 100 malpractice claims filed, only 17 appeared to involve a negligent injury, such as a medication overdose resulting in death, according to a 2004 New England Journal of Medicine review. This means that patients and lawyers appear to be suing the doctors and hospitals for non-negligent injury 83 percent of the time. Some researchers have likened our malpractice system to a traffic cop who gives out 100 tickets to nab 17 drivers who have run a red light, in the process ticketing 83 who drove through a green light quite properly. The second paradox is this: Studies of hospital records show that of every 100 injuries that occur due to medical negligence, only two result in malpractice claims. This means that 98 of 100 negligent injuries go unchallenged. To continue with the traffic analogy, of all the drivers who run red lights, only a very few are caught and receive a ticket.  Read more...

The Facts About Health Care Reform
Michael Egren

Egren's Insights, 2/10/10

As the CEO of a manufacturing business I spent over 25 years developing extensive expertise regarding the issues of health care. There is a good reason that most politicians, commentators, and journalists know so little about the problems and solutions. It is a tremendously complex problem that touches on everything from the health care system itself, to Federal, State, municipal and school budgets, to even our education system which fails to adequately educate students to understand our own economic system. It is frustrating to be dependent on politicians to improve the health care system, who appear to have such inadequate problem solving skills. Frequently it appears they are coming up with solutions when they don’t even understand the problem or the cause of the problem. Perhaps the following list of questions below can help people understand the importance of reform, the problems that need to be solved, and possible solutions. Read more...

Next Step for U.S. Health Care
Michael Egren

Egren's Insights, 4/5/10

If you understand my summary of health reform issues, now that ObamaCare has passed, you will realize that instead of solving the root causes of the health care problems, the new legislation makes them worse. As a result, the government will continue to “negotiate” unrealistic costs for providers.  More and more providers will refuse to take Medicaid and Medicare patients, there won’t be enough retail patients to whom to spread a higher and higher cost. As costs for non-government beneficiaries continue to increase, along with mandates in the new legislation, insurance costs will have to increase. There is no way they can decrease as anticipated by the Democrats. Read more...

Cash-Poor Governments Ditching Public Hospitals
Suzanne Sataline

The Wall Street Journal, 8/29/10

Faced with mounting debt and looming costs from the new federal health-care law, many local governments are leaving the hospital business, shedding public facilities that can be the caregiver of last resort. A patient and care giver at Central Peninsula Hospital in Soldotna, Alaska, where the government is considering a partnership with the for-profit LHP Hospital Group of Texas. Officials in Lauderdale County, Ala., this spring opted to transfer their 91-year-old Eliza Coffee Memorial Hospital and other properties to a for-profit company after struggling to satisfy an angry bond insurer. "We were next to knocking on bankruptcy's door,' said Rhea Fulmer, a Lauderdale County commissioner who approved the deal with RegionalCare Hospital Partners, of Brentwood, Tenn, but with trepidation. She said the county had no guarantee the company would improve care in the decades to come. "Time will tell.' Read more...

The First Victims of Health Care Reform
Kate Pickert

Time, 8/26/10

As Democrats on the campaign trail do their best to drum up support for health care reform by touting the benefits that take effect this year, it's easy to forget that the full thrust of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act doesn't kick in until 2014. But by then, a few major players in the health care industry might have already experienced a real downside of the massive overhaul, so much so that they may no longer exist. Insurance agents and brokers and small insurance companies are among those who may have to scramble to stay afloat over the next few years. This is partly by design and partly an unintended consequence of a new law that is so sweeping, it will affect nearly every corner of an industry that accounts for one-sixth of the U.S. economy. Read more...

CBO Gives Us the Complete Picture Five Months Late
Keith Hennessey

KeithHennessey.com, 8/25/10

Last week CBO released their annual summer baseline update.  On page 6 (page 24 of the PDF) is a box titled “The Effects of Major Health Care Legislation on CBO’s Baseline.”  It provides an important new data point that was absent when the legislation was being debated. While I disagreed with some of the judgment calls CBO made during the health care debate, on the whole I think they did a good job under difficult circumstances.  This missing information, however, was and is a significant failing by the CBO.  Unlike with other major legislation, CBO’s scoring of the health laws blended spending increases and tax cuts into a single measure of deficit effects. The final scoring showed that these two bills combined would reduce the budget deficit over the next ten years. Read more...

Americans Losing Confidence in ObamaCare’s Promise of Lower Costs and Medicare Guarantee 
Fred Lucas

CNS News, 8/24/10

Americans are less confident they will be able to afford their health care now than they were before President Barack Obama signed the $1 trillion health care overhaul package, according to a poll released on the five-month anniversary of the president’s signature. A Thomson-Reuters consumer confidence poll released Monday said “Americans’ confidence in their ability to pay for and access health care has fallen by 5 percent since December 2009.” The survey encompassed 3,000 people.  Read more...