As the debate over remaking the US health system heats up, I’d like to make a modest request: Let’s stop talking about Obamacare. Drop the partisan, misleading, counterproductive, and increasingly irrelevant hot button label. Instead let’s talk about the pros and cons of what are likely to be some complex and far-reaching changes to the way Americans get their medical [...]
A proposal by congressional Republicans aimed at reducing health insurance costs for young people would substantially boost premiums for those over age 50, according to a new analysis by the actuarial firm Milliman Inc. The proposal could result in up to 18,000 older adults losing health coverage and increase the cost of federal insurance subsidies by $6.7 billion, if the [...]
The Trump Administration and congressional Republicans seem to be moving full speed towards capping federal payments for Medicaid--a design sometime called block grants. But they may be missing a key piece of the story: Two-thirds of the program’s dollars go to the frail elderly and younger people with disabilities. The stereotype of a Medicaid beneficiary is a poor mom and [...]
Georgia Congressman Tom Price, President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee to run the Department of Health and Human Services, is a bundle of contradictions when it comes to Medicare. He certainly is not alone. Trump and congressional Republicans have sent their own very mixed signals about Medicare. The House GOP very much wants to turn the program into what it calls premium [...]
Washington is buzzing with speculation about how President-elect Donald Trump and the Republican majority in Congress will remake Medicare and Medicaid. But neither the incoming administration nor the Hill GOP is giving much thought to what those changes would mean for frail older adults and younger people with disabilities. By failing to do so, they are creating a potential crisis [...]
During his presidential campaign, Donald Trump was largely silent on Medicare, though he often suggested he’d leave the program untouched. Not any more. It now looks as if Trump may push for major changes in the principal health care program for older adults and some younger people with disabilities. But what will he do? He has not said, but House [...]
Early in the presidential campaign, Hillary Clinton proposed a package of ideas aimed at helping adult children who care for aging parents and other relatives. Yesterday, Donald Trump embraced a similar idea. Family caregiving, it seems, is going mainstream. It is striking that both Clinton and Trump are talking about an issue that until now has flown far below the [...]
For the first time, both major political parties have explicitly recognized in their platforms the need for community-based long-term care. While the Democratic and Republican platforms included few specific recommendations, the fact that they acknowledged the importance of personal assistance and social supports for older adults (and in the Democrats’ case, for younger people with disabilities) is a significant step [...]