I have never been to a doctor who I’ve had a problem with. I can’t think of a single time. If you have experienced a bad physician visit or a physician you did not click with, the reality may be that you were a bad patient. Or perhaps you were an ill-prepared patient. An empowered patient tries to get the most out of their physician visits.
Category: Direct Primary Care
Welfare and Workfare Reform Under President Clinton
New Jersey Sen. Frank Lautenberg predicted American cities would resemble the streets of Calcutta, with “children begging for food and 8- and 9-year-old prostitutes.” California Rep. Nancy Pelosi said that the bill would devastate children and was “a dishonor to the God that made them.” California Rep. Maxine Waters labeled the bill “shameful.”
John Lewis of Georgia alluded to Nazi Germany by asserting of his colleagues: “They are coming for the children . . . coming for the poor, coming for the sick, the elderly and disabled.”
Eventually President Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act of 1996, which proved these objections wrong.
Just Say “No!” to Hospital Bailouts
More health care dollars are spent in hospitals than any other health care sector. Nearly one-third (31%) of the $4.255 trillion in health care expenditures are spent on hospital care. Physician care is 14.9%, while drugs are 8.9%. Thirty years ago, presidential candidate Ross Perot described a “giant sucking sound” due to jobs being sucked abroad by the North American Free Trade Agreement. Nowadays the giant sucking sound is the sound of workers’ and taxpayers’ income being sucked into hospitals due to price gouging and high hospital prices.
Friday Links
- CBO: 6.2 million people will become uninsured due to the Medicaid unwinding as about 15.5 million people transfer away from the program. In Priceless, I argued that we should have government funded premium support for private insurance instead of privately managed Medicaid.
- Both Biden and Trump favor industrial policy. Here is why economists are skeptical.
- Why giving to public health in poor countries is sometimes better than giving people cash. (Yglesias)
- One in five adults experience chronic pain. (NYT) it may not be all in your mind, but your mind is definitely involved.
- More from the CBO: federal tax subsidies for employer-provided health insurance cost $2,075 per person in FY 2023 — significantly less than the federal cost of both Medicaid expansion ($7,069) and Obamacare premium subsidies ($6,169).
- Paragon: The expected drop in Medicaid enrollment, as people migrate to employer plans, is a large net positive for the federal budget.