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Journal Article
Lessons from variations in state Medicaid expenditures
Because Medicaid is absorbing a large and growing share of government spending in every state, policymakers are under intense pressure to control the cost of this budget-breaking program. In search of clues concerning Medicaid cost containment, this article examines state data on per-recipient Medicaid spending by type of service. This effort suggests focusing on nursing homes, because per-recipient payments to these institutions are highly variable across states. Indeed, the article concludes that a key explanation for cross-state differences in per-recipient Medicaid expenses is the ...
Journal Article
Observations: a bill of [mental] health
The new economic incentives managed care has created have been key ingredients in keeping the cost of mental health treatment from boiling over.
Journal Article
No free aspirin?
Journal Article
The impact of employer payments for health insurance and social security on the premium for education and earnings inequality
The trend toward increased wage and income inequality that emerged in the 1980swith "the rich getting richer and the poor poorer"has attracted a great deal of attention and concern. One aspect of this phenomenon has been the growing premium for education, with the disparity between the wage and salary earnings of the least and best educated rising since 1979. A related observation involves the increased earnings inequality among similar workers, which occurred in the 1970s as well as the 1980s.> This exploratory article seeks to broaden the discussion by asking whether the rising cost of ...
Conference Paper
Covering the uninsured: costs, benefits, and policy alternatives for New England
On December 5, 2006, the New England Public Policy Center at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston convened a policy symposium, ?Covering the Uninsured: Costs, Benefits, and Policy Alternatives for New England.? As a growing number of Americans find themselves without health insurance, New England states are exploring innovative policies aimed at extending coverage. But the high cost of expanding coverage raises difficult questions about how best to improve access while preserving individual choice and maintaining quality of care. ; The conference, which brought together a select group of ...
Journal Article
Cash, check or third party?
Prescription benefit plans are squeezing retail pharmacies.
Journal Article
Mandatory and affordable health insurance
This paper asserts that America's health care system is broken and cannot be repaired with timid half-measures. It suggests that we need both universal coverage and a more efficient delivery system and that these are not competing objectives: Each is necessary to make the other possible. It further states that if we do not make health care more affordable and our delivery system more efficient and sustainable, a majority of Americans will be uninsured in short order. And the persistence of millions of uninsured impairs the efficiency we need to make health care and insurance affordable for ...
Journal Article
Employer health benefits and insurance expansions: Hawaii's experience
As policies are proposed to expand health insurance coverage in the United States, it is useful to focus on the experience of Hawaii, where employers are required to offer such insurance to their full-time employees. Our findings suggest that Hawaii?s law has substantially increased health insurance coverage in the state, although the impact has been partially offset by employers' increased reliance on the exempt class of employees who work fewer than 20 hours per week.