As critics have repeatedly point out, once Congress starts specifying minimum mandated coverage requirements for health insurance there will be no end to the lobbying to maximize the “minimum” that you will have to pay for in your health plan. Well, it turns out Congress is already behaving exactly as …
The House health bill (H.R. 3962) creates a new minimum federal standard benefit package that will eventually apply to nearly all health plans, and establishes a new “Health Benefits Advisory Committee”. The Committee, housed within HHS, will make detailed recommendations, which the Secretary of HHS would then impose on all …
On Monday the Senate Finance Committee unveiled the legislative text of S. 1796 — dubbed “America’s Healthy Future Act” — revealing to fans of legislative “bloatware” a new one for the record book! Not only does this latest entry in the Congress League’s 111th season “monster bill” competition outstrip all …
Last month, Senator Kent Conrad (D-ND) suggested that maybe some form of “consumer cooperative” might be a politically acceptable alternative to the “competing public plan” idea. Since then, growing opposition to the “public plan” has fueled growing interest among Sen. Conrad’s colleagues in his “co-op” idea. However, as with the …
Last Sunday, in an appearance on FOX News Sunday with Chris Wallace, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) repeated yet another justification for including a “public plan” option in health care legislation. Since other advocates of a public plan have recently been offering the same justification, it is worth taking …
