Posted in Healthcare on Sep 28th, 2011
As a resident of Ohio and purchaser of individual health insurance, I am particularly interested in how Ohio is impacted by the Obamacare reforms. In a previous post this year I performed a simple price check of similar health care policies in Ohio and in Massachusetts using my family information. Massachusetts was chosen as a [...]
Posted in Healthcare on Apr 29th, 2011
Entrepreneurs create new private marketplaces – years ahead of similar exchanges called for in the health law – in a move that could save employers money but continue to shift cost and responsibility to employees. Here’s the quote that got my attention since it is an issue no one seems to be talking about [...]
Posted in Healthcare on Apr 17th, 2011
I posted this as a comment to Ezra Klein’s post, The high-deductible plans in the Affordable Care Act. My complaint with his post is that although high-deductible plans are in the Affordable Care Act, they made them very expensive when compared to existing high-deductible plans. If this is reform, I want no part of it. [...]
Posted in Healthcare on Apr 12th, 2011
Ouch! As a health care plan, Romneycare is an unmitigated fiasco. It has caused costs to skyrocket, insurance premiums to soar and nonprofit providers like Blue Cross to suffer hundreds of millions of dollars in losses. But as a political policy, Romneycare is nearly unparalleled in Republican history. It has destroyed one front-runner’s presidential hopes [...]
Posted in Healthcare on Apr 9th, 2011
In a previous post I compared my health insurance costs in Ohio with the lowest available plan in Massachusetts. The Massachusetts health care system is our best example of a fully implemented PPACA. The lowest available plan in Massachusetts would cost me an additional $991 per month or $11,892 per year. Now I see an [...]
Posted in Healthcare on Apr 3rd, 2011
on Taylor who is now blogging on The Incidental Economist blog pointed out an interesting essay on the Economics of Privately Sponsored Social Insurance by Uwe Reinhardt. The interesting part of the essay for me was his definition for employer-based insurance: Employment-based group health insurance, American style, is publicly subsidized, privately sponsored, community-rated social insurance [...]
Posted in Healthcare on Mar 11th, 2011
Healthcare cost shifting is an issue that is near and dear to my heart. As a healthy person I have been practicing my form of “cost shifting” for over ten years. My health care strategy arose when I moved to Cincinnati and was unemployed. When I looked at the COBRA insurance rates and our health [...]
Posted in Healthcare on Mar 11th, 2011
Here is a great resource for the key issues in health care reform. Nice job Austin! Last fall I posted slides for my talk on the challenges presented by our health care system. In preparation for giving it tonight in my community and twice more at the University of Chicago and MIT, I’ve updated the [...]
Posted in Healthcare on Feb 14th, 2011
A co-worker of mine is in the process of finalizing his quote for the hospital costs for his second child. He is using the same hospital that he used for his first child. For the first child he was charged $15,000 by the hospital but he eventually settled for a lower amount when he started making [...]
Posted in Healthcare, Humor on Feb 14th, 2011
How many funerals do I need to go to before I stop hearing people saying, “She should have been taken off of those drugs years ago. You know…I hear it causes permanent damage to the internal organs.” In the last couple of years I heard this twice.
On this day, the Virginia Tech community reflects on the vibrant lives of the 32 students and faculty who were tragically taken from us a year ago. Through light, art, and music we pay tribute to each and every person we lost. We gather to honor our friends, colleagues, and family members. We will never forget.