The Unbroken Window

Let’s take a live look-in at how that health reform is going in Massachusetts.
“I’ve seen in recent weeks the rates of my small-business insurance group go up 55 percent,” said the self-employed attorney from Richmond. “I haven’t seen the reform that was touted in Massachusetts.”
Where is the outrage from the Commander in Grief?
During [...]

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… can there be a perceived shortage of medical practitioners (rising wages and salaries of the privileged cartel seems to indicate this), and only in America can there be a push to get more people into the formal health care sector, and only in America can a downturn in the economy increase the demand by [...]

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Here are some highlights:
What do the data tell us about insurance companies rescinding coverage and refusing to pay claims if individuals fail to list any medical conditions? Here’s what Duggan writes:
A House committee investigation found that three large insurers rescinded nearly 20,000 policies over a five-year period, saving these companies $300 million that would otherwise [...]

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When I started at the U of R a couple of years ago, I was offered the opportunity to enroll in a group health insurance program. The University obviously uses Excellus (it is based here in Rochester). My choice of plans had nothing to do with differences in services covered, doctors in the plans, etc. [...]

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Yesterday the New York Times ran a piece describing Professor Bill Baumol’s “cost disease” problem in economics. Very simply, the theory says that some sectors that are labor intensive would be expected to have its costs increase faster than less labor intensive sectors because productivity improvements are harder to come by when lots of human [...]

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Ex ante, it is rare to know when it is coming, but for the aged:
The main argument we make is that existing theoretical and empirical analysis of the value of life do not apply, and often under-values, the value of life near its end and terminal care. We argue that several factors drive up the [...]

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This is a must read parable from Warren Meyer. My wife and I just had a similar experience in the health insurance market. We have run through our annual deductible on our “high” deductible health plan (the one we like, and the one being phased out under the new progressive reforms), so our insurance is [...]

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My employer is particularly “generous” in terms of the share of health insurance costs that they pay on my behalf versus the share I must contribute on my own. Our family chooses to “buy” a HSA Eligible High Deductible Health Plan. So for low premiums, we have high deductible insurance that kicks in when we [...]

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Some in the current health insurance debate argue that you simply cannot introduce market forces into the health system and still hope the needy are served. Here is a little bit of evidence, so does increased competition across hospitals reduce charity care?
Despite the pervasive belief that competition impedes a hospital’s ability to offer services to [...]

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It is possible that doing things outside the public school classroom improves learning outcomes better than anything currently being done inside the classroom:
This paper examines the impact of public health insurance expansions through both Medicaid and SCHIP on children’s educational outcomes, measured by 4th and 8th grade reading and math test scores, available from the [...]

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