Good news: at least one person has actually signed up for health insurance on healthcare.gov.
Cancer cost the EU €126 billion in 2009, but the burden varies from country to country.
Heritage Foundation: how the exchanges we propose are different from ObamaCare.
If the 33-year-old single father wants the same level of coverage next year as what he has now with the same insurer and the same network of doctors and hospitals, his monthly premium of $233 will more than double. If he wants to keep his monthly payments in check, the Carpentersville resident is looking at an annual deductible for himself and his 7-year-old daughter of $12,700, a more than threefold increase from $3,500 today…
To promote the Oct. 1 debut of the exchanges, the online marketplaces where consumers can shop and buy insurance, Obama administration and Illinois officials touted the lower-than-expected monthly premiums that would make insurance more affordable for millions of Americans. But a [Chicago] Tribune analysis shows that 21 of the 22 lowest-priced plans offered on the Illinois health insurance exchange for Cook County have annual deductibles of more than $4,000 for an individual and $8,000 for family coverage. (More)
Researchers found that hospitals eliminate 1.7 full-time jobs for every $100,000 drop in Medicare revenue, and nurses accounted for one-third of those cuts. On average, hospitals do not appear to make up for Medicare cuts by “cost shifting,” but by adjusting their operating expenses over the long run, the study says. The Medicare price cuts in the Affordable Care Act will significantly slow the growth in hospitals’ total revenues and operating expenses.
Study here. We’ve previously reported that cuts affect patients.
This is from an NBER Working Paper:
On average, a $1 change in Medicare’s relative payments results in a $1.30 change in private payments. We find that Medicare similarly moves the level of private payments when it alters fees across the board. Medicare thus strongly influences both relative valuations and aggregate expenditures on physicians’ services. We show further that Medicare’s price transmission is strongest in markets with large numbers of physicians and low provider consolidation.
HT to Tyler Cowen, who draws implications.
Maine has decided to allow importing of prescription drugs from countries that control the prices of said drugs. The result will be a discount for Maine residents, some decrease in the incentives and money for drug discovery and, eventually, some sort of government or private action that shuts down this gambit…
I expect that Maine’s scheme will…flounder. For starters, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration bans the importation of prescription drugs from abroad. To be sure, the agency doesn’t work particularly hard at enforcing this ban, but it exists, and a whole state that defies it is likely to find itself in court. At which point, the judge will probably tell Maine to knock it off…
[I]f Maine’s law actually increases substantially the number of people who are buying their drugs abroad, you can expect Big Pharma to find a way to close that loophole, either legally or strategically. In the meantime, the saga will be another entry in the colorful history of Maine Governor Paul LePage.
From Megan McArdle.
The researchers found that hospitals with higher survival rates net of the cost of treatment were rewarded with more patients. More specifically, if in a given year hospital A had 10 percent higher productivity than hospital B, hospital A tended to have 25 percent higher market share that year and to experience 4 percent more growth over the subsequent five years.
The team also found that the variation in survival rates was more important in driving market share than the variation in cost was. In other words, patients seem to seek out hospitals with better survival rates but not ones with lower costs.
More from Pete Orszag.
The ACA is therefore expected to cause a “seismic shift” in HDHP enrollment. Small employers newly required to purchase employees’ insurance may well choose HDHPs as the least expensive coverage option. Larger employers might adopt HDHPs to achieve ACA-regulated premium levels and avoid the 2018 “Cadillac tax.”
For individuals without employer-based insurance options, ACA-instituted health insurance exchanges will provide coverage at four levels of generosity (bronze, silver, gold, and platinum) to 5 to 10% of Americans younger than 65…Cover Oregon, for example, estimates that cost sharing for Oregon families with incomes between 200 and 399% of the poverty level will include $5,000 deductibles, 30% coinsurance for many services even after reaching the deductible, and out-of-pocket spending maximums of $8,500 to $12,700.
One man’s four day (unsuccessful) quest to sign up for ObamaCare.
How many have signed up for ObamaCare? The administration won’t say.
Betting on how long the shutdown will last: consensus is 18 days.
63-year-old Californian sees his premiums double. (I thought this group was supposed to gain?)
