Health Policy Program: Latest Articles

The question of whether a new public health insurance plan should be allowed to compete with private health insurance plans has polarized the health reform debate unnecessarily. Extremes from both political parties have tried to use the issue to prevent progress toward a bipartisan health reform package.

But health reform must be bipartisan to be sustainable over time. This means both sides' priorities must be reflected in the policy solution.

Our nation must re-establish fiscal balance as soon as macroeconomically permissible. At this moment, there is no question that we must take substantive steps to stimulate our economy and address the crises in our housing and financial markets.

In fact, I have never seen such consensus in a profession as argumentative as economics. But America's economic and social futures are also threatened by several long-term challenges. First among these is the ever-rising cost of health care.

There is an encouraging – perhaps surprising – amount of agreement that health care in the United States must be reformed now. Key players in the debate, from Wal-Mart executives to labor union leaders, agree that reform should expand affordable health coverage to all, that no one should be denied insurance, and that government, employers and individuals should all share responsibility for funding health care.

Health care reform has once again returned to the national “to-do” list, with politicians of all stripes calling for action. Historic parallels with the early 1990s are striking. The economy is weak, health care costs are high and rising, and an anxious middle class is feeling the squeeze. Facing what could be a major recession, states need to trim spending, and businesses see health costs as undercutting their ability to compete globally.[1],[2]

Eleanor Browning lived a singular life, traveling into her 80s to places like Bhutan and Afghanistan. In 2007, at age 96, she also died a singular death, and in so doing, offered a compelling case for what hospice care aims to be for people nearing the end of life.