HELENA, Mont. — As Republican legislative leaders in Montana girded for this year’s battle over whether to extend Medicaid expansion in the state, they took aim at one of the program’s biggest backers: hospitals. If Montana’s hospitals wanted to extend the government health insurance program that cost taxpayers about $1 billion in 2024, and benefit…
That is the topic of a paper by Katherine Wagner (2022). The paper won the 2025 American Economic Journal: Economic Policy best papers award (despite being published 3 years ago). In her paper, Dr. Wagner uses data from 20 US Atlantic and Gulf Coast states between 2001 and 2017. Housing valuation data come from Zillow…
They’re the fixers, the ones who step in when Affordable Care Act enrollees have a problem with their coverage, like a newborn incorrectly left off a policy or discovering that a rogue broker had signed them up or switched their plan without consent. Specially trained caseworkers help resolve such issues, which might otherwise cause consumers…
Eboni Tomasek expected to take home her newborn the day after he was born in a San Jose hospital. But, without explanation, hospital staff said they needed to stay a second night. Then a third. A nurse said her son had jaundice. Then said that he didn’t. She wondered if they had confused her with…
By EMILY JOHNSON Being a parent during residency requires one or more of the following: ● Family and/or friends nearby who are willing and able to provide free childcare ● A stay-at-home spouse/co-parent ● A spouse/co-parent who is willing to let their own career to be a distant second…
How did Medicaid expansion under the Affordable Care Act impact health insurance coverage, cost and mental health? That is the question asked by Andreyeva, Rochford and Marthey (2025). They use 2011-2019 data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) to examine outcomes for Americans aged 26–54 with at least one child living in the…
The assisted living facility in Edina, Minnesota, where Jean Peters and her siblings moved their mother in 2011, looked lovely. “But then you start uncovering things,” Peters said. Her mother, Jackie Hourigan, widowed and developing memory problems at 82, too often was still in bed when her children came to see her midmorning. “She wasn’t…
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — California has halted a court-ordered medical parole program, opting instead to send its most incapacitated prisoners back to state lockups or release them early. The unilateral termination is drawing protests from attorneys representing prisoners and the author of the state’s medical parole legislation, who say it unnecessarily puts this vulnerable population at…
By MATT McCORD Using opioids to treat acute pain is a lot like burning coal to power our homes. Both are legacy solutions from an earlier era. Both were once celebrated as breakthroughs. And both have since proven to be dirty, dangerous, and incredibly costly to clean up. Despite this, we continue to rely on…
Tariffs on pharmaceuticals. First, President Trump has voiced his goal to impose tariffs on pharmaceutical products made overseas. The New York Times reports: Mr. Trump said in remarks to reporters on Monday that pharmaceutical tariffs would come in the “not too distant future.”“We don’t make our own drugs anymore,” Mr. Trump said. “The drug companies…