- Insurers blame hospitals and drugs companies for rising health care costs.
- Why lower prices do not necessarily lower health care spending.
- Obamacare penalizes marriage. Thanks to Devon Herrick for the pointer.
- The federal government’s increasing share of spending has grown from 32 percent to nearly 50 percent today.
- “French supertax on wealthy raises only a quarter of planned revenue,”
- 2025 was far and away the worst year for measles cases in the 21st century.
- Deporting workers lowers our GDP.
- Three bills offer Health Savings Account solutions for the Obamacare impasse in Congress.
Category: Cost of Healthcare
Thune comes under GOP pressure to bypass Democrats on health care
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) is coming under increasing pressure from Senate Republican colleagues to bring health care legislation to the Senate floor amid fears of a Democratic wave in November. Conservatives are pushing the GOP to move a package similar to President Trump’s new health care reform proposal through the budget reconciliation process, which would allow it to avoid a Democratic filibuster and pass the Senate with a simple majority.
Saturday Links – 24 January 2026
- A Trump trade deal that is good for the US and the UK.
- There is supposed to be a $2,000 cap on Medicare enrollee drug spending. So how do some people reach the cap after spending only $1,200?
- How to reform the food stamp program.
- Kotlikoff on entitlement programs:
Earn or save $1 too much and, depending on the state, lose thousands of dollars in your own or your family members’ Medicaid benefits. Hold $1 too much in assets and forfeit thousands in Supplemental Security Income (SSI). Earn an extra dollar in a Medicaid non-expansion state and receive thousands of dollars in otherwise unavailable [Obamacare] subsidies.
In 2023, a record 62 million Americans smoked pot; 17 million now use it daily or near daily. One in 12 young adults used a hallucinogen; one in 18 misused prescription stimulants such as Adderall. Another 2.6 million Americans over 12 took meth. Overdoses still claim the lives of 70,000 Americans annually; the majority died using synthetic opioids like fentanyl. HT: Arnold Kling
Friday Links
- Direct primary care for everyone: A $2,000 voucher and 600 patients per doctor.
- A new FDA rule: In testing for new drugs, companies no longer have to ignore what they already know.
- Why the drop in fentanyl deaths? A fentanyl “drought,” which may have its causes in China.
- America is experiencing a “once-in-a-lifetime improvement in public safety despite a police-staffing crisis.”
- Artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots in healthcare top the 2026 list of the most significant health technology hazards.