The Health Care Blog

Health Care Outlook Not Improving

By ROBERT LASZEWSKI Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mon) released his much-anticipated healthcare proposal Wednesday morning. The next big test for a health care bill in 2009 (notice that I did not call it health care reform) will come in Senate Finance....
September 21, 2009 in Reform, Robert Laszewski, Senate, Senate Finance Committee | Permalink | Comments (58)

The Chairman's Mark - Good Ideas, Potentially Fatal Flaws

By ROGER COLLIER So, at long last, Senator Max Baucus has released his Chairman’s Mark draft health care reform bill for discussion by the full Senate Finance Committee. The 223-page draft bill is generally consistent with the “Framework for a...
September 16, 2009 in Medicare Advantage, Reform, Roger Collier, Senate Finance Committee | Permalink | Comments (3)

Happy Trails, Trigger

By ROGER COLLIER Okay, my apologies to Roy Rogers, but I was pleased to see in the New York Times that the idea of a public plan trigger is finally getting serious consideration by the White House and by Senate...
September 8, 2009 in Health Plans, Reform, Roger Collier, Senate Finance Committee | Permalink | Comments (3)

Health Care Reform Coming Out of Senate Finance?

By ROBERT LASZEWSKI We’ve been getting lots of news these past few days leading to optimism that a bipartisan health care bill will soon emerge from discussions between the “Coalition of the Willing.” That term refers to the three Republicans...
July 29, 2009 in Congress, Policy/Politics, Reform, Robert Laszewski, Senate Finance Committee | Permalink | Comments (20)

Has Harry Reid Torpedoed Reform?

By ROGER COLLIER Health care reform ran into new BIG trouble this week with a series of comments from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. On Tuesday, Reid leapt into the middle of reform negotiations, telling Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max...
July 10, 2009 in Policy/Politics, Reform, Roger Collier, Senate Finance Committee | Permalink | Comments (13)

Unions May Get a Pass on Health Care Benefits Tax

By ROBERT LAWSZEWSKI There is a major bipartisan effort going on in the Senate Finance Committee to reform the health care system. Reportedly, one of the elements of that effort may be a tax on "gold plated" health insurance benefits...
June 29, 2009 in Economics, Robert Laszewski, Senate Finance Committee, The Industry, Unions | Permalink | Comments (6)

MedPac on Steroids

By MAGGIE MAHAR Maggie Mahar is an award winning journalist and author. A frequent contributor to THCB, her work has appeared in Barron's and Institutional Investor. She is the author of Money-Driven medicine: The Real Reason Why healthcare costs so...
June 5, 2009 in Congress, Medicare, Obama administration, Policy, Reform, Senate Finance Committee | Permalink | Comments (13)

The Cost of Health Reform - $1.5 Trillion or ... ?

By ROGER COLLIER Putting the political cart firmly before the horse, the Senate Finance Committee heard testimony last week on how to pay for reform—before they had reliable estimates of how much it is likely to cost. It’s not that...
May 20, 2009 in Economics, Roger Collier, Senate Finance Committee | Permalink | Comments (3)

Connecting finance to coverage

By Matthew Holt Repeating his message that Health Costs Are the Real Deficit Threat OMB Director Peter Orszag goes into the not exactly friendly territory of the WSJ Opinion pages and explains that practice variation is unnecessary and wasteful, comparative...
May 15, 2009 in Congress, Policy, Policy/Politics, Senate Finance Committee, Wall Street Journal | Permalink | Comments (16)