If I am ever asked the McCarthy-esque question "Are you now, or have you ever been, a member of the Journolist?" I will have to answer, "Yes." This is the short story of how that came to be and my experience on the list.

I am a doctoral student in...

Theda Skocpol has an interesting analysis in the July issue of Health Affairs that makes me anxious. In it, she takes a look at Republican challenges to health reform and gives special attention to the mid-term elections and the stumbling blocks facing the implementation of reform. I wrote about...

Health reform will do a lot of things that most Americans don't realize it will do, and it will not do a lot of things that many Americans mistakenly believe it will do. One of the most recognizable components of health reform that didn't actually become law is the public...

There's a lot of information out there. In fact, there's so much data that while our computers might be able to wade through it all, our brains can't make much sense out of it until we reduce it to something more manageable. For instance, if I asked you to pick...

There are a lot of reasons why U.S. health care is so expensive: high prices, supplier-induced demand, insulation from costs via insurance coverage, etc. One of our problems is that we generally dislike being sick and are especially averse to death. Call it survival instinct, human nature, or something else,...

Today, another lesson in why you should never take anything Rush Limbaugh says at face value without first doing your homework. On his radio program, Rush called President Obama a liar for making claims that the health care law contains numerous Republican ideas--including the idea of the insurance exchanges, which...

In America, our work ethic is next to none. We work longer hours each day, more days per week, and more weeks per year than just about anywhere else on Earth, with the possible exception of Japan. When the French are sunning themselves for three weeks on the beaches of...

I'm no socialist, but sometimes when I look at the history of the United States, I'm left to conclude that Marx was on to something. You see, when our country was founded, we actually enjoyed a fair amount of equality among our citizens (this of course, ignores the dark truth...

The new law of the land requires everyone to have health insurance or else pay a fine. Let's put aside for a moment the policy rationales for and against such a requirement and the legal questions over the Constitutionality of such a mandate and ask the most practical of all...

A friend of mine recently alerted me to this series of interviews on CNN.com that asked physicians what they thought about health reform. Their answers were interesting. Before I get into what they said, however, I think it's important to acknowledge the strengths and limitations of the approach. The...

If you'll think back about a year-and-a-half ago, you might recall that big business--long a holdout on the issue--was finally speaking out in support of the urgent need for health reform. At the time, they were motivated to address the issue of rising costs that were unsustainable. That seems like...

Health reform is law. Health reform is law. I have to keep saying it to myself. And now that health reform is law, everyone seems to be asking the next logical question: What does this mean for me? I've tried to help by pointing you in the direction of a...

A central aspect of health care reform is expanding access to care by requiring individuals to obtain health insurance coverage. Of course, this presupposes that having health insurance matters. There is a large body of literature in this area showing that it does matter for health outcomes, but the most...

A few days ago, I wrote a post that included a link to some data on the health care vote assembled by the Washington Post. Wonk and researcher that I am, I decided to crunch some numbers to find out if the data could be used to predict how House...

Wright on Health has heard from sources that do not wish to be disclosed that House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) plans to resign after allegations surfaced that Boehner had an inappropriate relationship with a male staffer. According to one source, the relationship in question began late one evening on...

I almost don't know where to begin. Should I write about the long history of failed health reform efforts that just witnessed its streak come to an end? Should I continue trying to explain the legislation so that people will have a better understanding of what it does and does...

When President Obama and others have gone before the American people to promote their health reform agenda, they've often over-simplified an important set of tools available to us in health services research. The President has said things like "If you just bought a new car, and then find out that...

There's been some talk "out there" that reconciliation is an undemocratic process, because it doesn't go through the regular legislative channels. While I am forced to ask how any process requiring a majority vote in favor for passage can be undemocratic, it's not quite that simple. While my point may...

When one or two firms control upwards of 75% of the market share in many states, it's fair to say that insurance companies aren't really competing against each other. Or perhaps it's more accurate to say that there's a lot of room to inject more competition into the market. As...

Ezra Klein nailed it the other day when he wrote the following:

"There's a difference between the statements 'America has the best health care system in the world' and 'With enough money, you can purchase the best health care in the world in America.' But that difference gets...