Entitlements

Feb 8, 2016

Top 400 Taxpayers See Tax Rates Rise, But There’s More to the Story

As Americans were gathering party supplies to greet the New Year, the Internal Revenue Service released their annual report of cumulative tax data reported on the 400 tax r...

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Feb 4, 2016

Chlorine Bleach Plants Needlessly Endanger 63 Million Americans

Chlorine bleach plants across the U.S. put millions of Americans in danger of a chlorine gas release, a substance so toxic it has been used as a chemical weapon. Greenpeace’s new repo...

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Jan 25, 2016

U.S. Industrial Facilities Reported Fewer Toxic Releases in 2014

The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data for 2014 is now available. The good news: total toxic releases by reporting facilities decreased by nearly six percent from 2013 levels. Howe...

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Jan 22, 2016

Methane Causes Climate Change. Here's How the President Plans to Cut Emissions by 40-45 Percent.

UPDATE (Jan. 22, 2016): Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released its proposed rule to reduce methane emissions...

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more news

Review of Books On Health Care Costs

Nov 16, 2007 by Matt Lewis

A good article on health care cost issues from the American Prospect. It's a review of three new books on health care that are broadening the debate over health care costs outside the context of the long-term fiscal challenge. For years health care policy people have focused on insurance as a cure for all that ails the health care system, overlooking the cost-inefficiencies of the delivery system. Only recently has there been a good discussion. This discussion is now having a spill-over affect on fiscal policy, which is pretty awesome.

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CBO's Health Care Projections

Nov 14, 2007 by Matt Lewis

CBO just released an impressive document on health care costs and long-term fiscal issues. It includes:

A more realistic projection of health care costs, absent changes in federal law
The relative importance of an aging population, health care costs, and social security costs
A systematic explanation of the rise in health care costs and its value
A discussion of possible remedies to excess health care costs

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The Inherent Superiority of the Private Sector

Nov 7, 2007 by Matt Lewis

Businesses are moving on ideas to incentize better quality and cost-efficient health care. Why is it taking so long for government to do the same?

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Leave Social Security Be

Nov 7, 2007 by Matt Lewis

Paul Starr explains why it's a bad idea to tinker with Social Security now- even if the solution is to raise the payroll tax.

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SCHIP Is About Politics

Nov 5, 2007 by Matt Lewis

The NYT a pretty interesting article on the politics behind SCHIP, but it has big problems. First, the article makes it pretty clear that the President decided to veto this bill regardless of what was in it. He has never tried to work with the bill's designers to come up with an acceptable compromise. The veto is entirely his decision and his fault. So why then is the headline "Missteps on Both Sides Led to Health Bill Veto?" Now, who's fault is it that the veto wasn't overridden?

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Senate Approves Revised SCHIP Bill

Nov 2, 2007 by Matt Lewis

Last night, the Senate passed the latest version of the SCHIP package. The 65-30 vote (roll call is veto-proof, because enough Senators who didn't vote are reliable "yea" votes. Since the bill did not receive a veto-proof majority in the House, Congressional leaders may decide to not send the bill to the President. Instead, Senate and House negotiators appear to be working hard on a new compromise bill that could be voted on as early as next week.

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One If By Legislation, Two If By Regulation

Nov 1, 2007 by Matt Lewis

The House Committe on Oversight and Government Reform had a hearing today on the Bush administration's backdoor Medicaid cuts. Extremely loyal BudgetBlog readers may recall that the Administration has been pushing for rules that would cut Medicaid ever since the same cuts were rejected by the last (Republican-controlled!) Congress. I guess they haven't given up. The Administration is claiming that the rules will cut down on bad claims on Medicaid. Not so, says Chairman Waxman.

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Former Social Security Commissioner: No Cuts Necessary

Oct 29, 2007 by Matt Lewis

Robert Ball, the former commissioner of Social Security under Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon, takes issue with the claim that Social Security balance requires benefit cuts. Why? Times have changed. In the Oct. 19 editorial " Mr. Giuliani's No-Tax Pledge," The Post stated: "It's no more responsible for Republicans to rule out tax increases [to strengthen Social Security] than it is for Democrats to insist on no benefit cuts." The Post praised, as a "bipartisan blend," President Ronald Reagan's acceptance of a 1983 fix that included both.

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Best Medical System In The World

Oct 26, 2007 by Matt Lewis

Another example of medical inefficiency (the foundation of the long-term fiscal problem). The Washington Post on the study showing that children's cold medication is ineffective: For years, Joshua Sharfstein shuddered whenever he walked down a drugstore aisle lined with cough and cold products for babies and toddlers. "It never ceased to aggravate me," said Sharfstein, a pediatrician and father of two young boys. "Kids with colds were getting these medicines that had never been shown to be either effective or safe."

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Conservatives Prevent Veto-Proof Vote on SCHIP

Oct 25, 2007 by Matt Lewis

The House got a little closer to the veto-proof 2/3rds majority today, but in the end conservatives basically blocked the bill once again. The vote was 265-142 (roll call). SCHIP supporters made a bunch of concessions around program eligibility. What gives? I guess these hyper-conservatives just don't want to spend more money on kids in particular, because we all know they'll throw away hundreds of billions for wars that are going nowhere.

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