Medicare Advantage plans are not included in the Biden Administration’s “demonstration project,” which effectively bribes insurers to not raise their out-of-pocket costs for drug coverage.
Source: Statnews
Category: Single-Payer/Medicare-for-All
Friday Links
- In 2023, the U.S. spent $4.8 trillion on healthcare. As much as half of that massive expenditure, $2.4 trillion, paid for activities unrelated to patient care called BARRCOME – bureaucracy, administration, rules, regulations, compliance, oversight, mandates, and enforcement.
- Medicare physician payments declined substantially from 2001 to 2024 — a whopping 29%.
- Currently, physicians are the only Medicare providers who do not receive annual, inflation-based payment updates.
- Head of the International Longshoremen’s Association explains what the strike is all about, along with a video showing how dockworkers can be replaced by automation. (it’s a long way from On the Water Front.
- Cato study: Marijuana doesn’t make you crazy.
- An Elon Musk device is allowing the blind to see.
Medicare’s Bribe to Coax Part D Insurers Not to Raise Their Premiums on the Eve of the Election Will Be Costly For Taxpayers
Yesterday, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its analysis of a newly announced Biden-Harris program intended to paper over the flaws of the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” (IRA). Based on CBO estimates, this election-year stunt to artificially lower the cost of seniors’ Part D premiums will cost taxpayers at least $7 billion in 2025, including $2 billion in additional interest on our already ballooning debt. If implemented as planned, this program could cost taxpayers more than $21 billion over the three-year demonstration.
Source: House Budget Committee
Thursday Links
- How can it be a crime for a consulting firm to help a drug company promote its product to customers?
- Members of Congress consistently beat the market on stock trades.
- Eli Lilly will allow self-pay patients to purchase (direct-to-consumer) the weight-loss drug Zepbound for less than half the list price.
- 10 states have passed new laws this year aimed at reducing the growing burden of prior authorization requirement.
- Opportunities for Democrats to learn about public policy while they were in Chicago: the city has the highest homicide rate in the country and only 21% of eight graders are proficient in reading. But did they really learn anything? (WSJ)